What if you just do a 24 hour timer? Rather than blast the entire army out in a single day, what about just a single day of effort? As long as you're working on the army, keep a stopwatch running. If you take a break, stop the clock. Put in three good 8 hour days, or a couple of 12s if you're feeling froggy.

I'd go with a series of "Unit in a night" or "Unit in 24 hours" challenges. Doable, fast and you can maintain decent quality control.

I am beginning to like the idea of stretching it out and my current conscious aka Azazelx may have hit it on the head. Now my Wife is away for 19 days and if I count each character as a single unit for the tomb kings army I believe (from memory so don't hold me to it) that I have 15 units to paint.

Therefore, I am beginning to formulate the goal of finishing the army, start to finish in the time she is away. Much more relaxed and I should have greater quality control as I won't be turning into a zombie. If I feel like it I may pump a couple of units out on say a Saturday allowing my weekdays to be a little quieter.

Thats sounds like a good plan last thing you want is to get stressed out painting them.

Think of it as your own personal version of Tripod's Songs in an Hour
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLsipicHg_m8-Epgo2i2HY7O0HMmHoQCHa

More seriously though, in the dark past I used to occasionally paint units in a(n over)night. Empire, Skaven, etc. Very doable, and still a decent quality when they're done.

Hi all again. Time to put the extreme painting ideas on hold as I have a very exciting update. Falcons! Yup, I now have both of the Falcons for my Eldar finished. So bear with me I have gone a little snap happy as I am pretty happy with how they turned out. Although they are pretty simple. So without further prattle, some pretty pictures.


I decided to keep both tanks the same (except for a slight armament difference) as well as continue the green and purple color scheme of the army. Since this is a Guardian vehicle I returned to the green being the primary color. I added some bone in to just act as a third counter that I feel works quite well. I attempted a gradient of the green from light to dark across the top of the tank to add a little interest to the models.


The Gradient shows up much better from directly above. I am really pleased with how it came together, especially as I don't own an airbrush so it was a little bit more practice at wet blending via brush for me. I decided to keep the weapon covers a bright green to make them really stand out from the rest of the tank. Sort of a "this bit is dangerous" sort of label.


The first Falcon with a Scatter Laser. In this closer pic you may be able to see that I did some gem work on the little bumps that are all over the model. Again, I think they have turned out fairly well.


The second Falcon with the traditional Shuriken Cannon, I purposely kept the Falcons cheap points wise with minimal upgrades as I don't often see a point in dumping points into extra features that I often completely forget about during games anyway.


A little detail of underneath the turrets and how the purple although hidden from above is still a very large part of the model. I kept the turrets and flying bases seperate from the rest of the model because it will be easier and safer to fit them into my foam trays if they come to pieces.


The undersides of the tanks. I hope you like purple.......I cheated a little bit and kept it very simple, basecoat and drybrush as I figured it will be a rarely seen part of the model so I didn't need to invest a lot of time in it.


Couldn't resist an action shot that also helps to show off the fact I painted the interior of both Falcon's as I didn't seal the rear hatches either. I think that the Falcon may have been one of the first GW model to boast an "interior" and I certainly thought I should continue my trend of painting vehicles interiors when one is offered. Eagle eyed readers may notice that I have added a yellow head crest to the Warlock on the right of the picture as I lacked a 6th yellow topped Warlock from the previous update.


The final picture of the update and another one of the Warlocks. The funny thing is they are the only Unit that would technically fit into the Falcon except if they had a Farseer accompany them. So maybe the Farseers will ride together in one and the Warlocks in the other? May be a tiny bit of overkill, but who knows?

So there you have the two Falcons, done and dusted which leaves the Hemlock Wraithfighter. I have the model unassembled at the moment. I am planning that since it is piloted by a Psyker that it will copy the Farseers and Warlocks and have the purple as the primary color so there is a very good chance that it will be a total opposite to the Falcons (Purple top and green underside) any thoughts?

So this leaves me a single model to paint for this army and puts me well ahead of my wife leaving for Europe so I may be bringing the Tomb Kings forward.....but then again I may put my energies into doing some terrain and carry cases until she leaves so I can do the Tomb Kings while she is away.

On the Tomb Kings note, I have decided that I will not do the army in 24 hours as I had previously thought. Wiser minds than mine have pointed out too many holes in the plan for my liking and instead I am going to target having the army done in the time my Wife is in Europe which amounts to 16 days. So in all likelihood it will end up being done in 24 hours, just spread out over two weeks. So still a challenge and still very quick.

So I am off to assemble the Hemlock. Please feel free as always to leave your thoughts and comments or just say high.

Thanks for reading.

High.


The falcons look great

They look very nice, the blending on the green looks really well done.

Love the Falcons! I really like that the purple is just little highlights on the top and the covers the bottom. Very striking!

The Falcons both look great. Very nice work on the Eldar. I've not gotten much done at all in the last week, but it's good to see you keeping up the pace.

You can always do the "prep work" for the Tomb KIngs in the meantime. Basing, assembly, movement trays, etc - so all you need to work on for the 16 days is actual painting.

Well its that time again for me to grace the forums and post my modelling progress. Without further adieu I present the Hemlock Wraithfighter.......


Or at least the Psychic Pilot....... how on earth you are supposed to manifest Psychic powers whilst controlling what I guess is an atmospheric, supersonic fighter plane. Ah the wonders of sci-fi......


I am actually a little disappointed that this guy gets sealed inside the cockpit. He is full of detail and far more interesting than the guys inside the Falcons.

Ok, ok I am kidding, I have made far more progress than the pilot. In fact I have managed to knock out the Hemlock in its entirety.


I am really happy with how the paint job went. I am also pleased that I chose to continue the Seer idea of reversing the colors compared to the Guardians.


Like the Falcons I did a little blending on the top surface. Shows up way better from directly above. This time however I went right to left rather than front to back. A little trippy, but I am overall rather happy with it.


A close up of the pilot after assembly. He stands out better than I thought he would. Which is nice because I did put a little effort into his appearance.


Just like the Falcons the underside of the Hemlock is the opposite army color. It gets seen a little more than the underside of the Falcons because of the flight stand. I did have a bit of a quandary as to the weapons color as if I did it in purple like just about everyone else's (or green like the Warlocks) it would have just blended in. So I thought bone or gold and in the end the bone won out.


So there you have it. My first ever 40k flyer. I think it is a pretty nice model. I think the flight stand is well thought out and very sturdy, the plane is unattached and I have no fear at all of it falling off mid game.

But what is more exciting about this update is with the completion of the Wraithfighter it means one thing. I have finished off this Eldar army so I can show the full army shots!


I wonder if when someone coined the term 'Greentide' anyone envisioned Eldar filling that role........


It amazes me how a more overhead shot really shows off the color change on the Falcons and Hemlock. They form very effective centrepiece models for what would be an otherwise very boring army.


The Farseers and independant Warlock squad. Hopefully when I get these guys on the tabletop I don't bore my opponent with an over the top Psychic phase. But seeing as I wanted a "Ulthwe" Style army I needed a bucket load of Psykers...


Look at all that Shuriken. I certainly hope I get to absolutely hose some unfortunate squad with all that pseudo rending. Plus throw in a few choice psychic powers and I hope I can devastate just about anything.


You have already seen it ad nauseum but for completeness sake here is the Hemlock Wraithfighter again.......


Annnnnd finally the Heavy Support of the army. I have had a lot of success in the dim dark past with support weapons, so I do hope they continue to do me proud. I don't have a lot of hope for the Falcons apart from nuisance factor. But at least they will look good doing it.

So there you have it. Another army down. Just need to do the foam carry case for them and box (plus I have to still do a box for the Ogre Kingdoms, although their foam is done). But I will be moving onto the Tomb Kings. I am about 20 Tomb Guard short of having the whole army (so if anyone has a few spare of those guys I am all ears). I am going to do the challenge of painting them whilst my Wife is in Europe. So I will spend my time over the next three weeks assembling the army so they are ready to rock and roll.

I am in the process of trying to work out a couple of unit fillers for the big block of Skeletons and Tomb Guard. I don't need to do it. But I like the modelling opportunity it gives me. Any ideas? Since my wife is an Archaelogist she suggested a few of the Tomb Guard carrying a Barque of Amun (since they are a rip of off Egypt) kind of on a palanquin. The idea really appeals, just need to figure it out. For the Skeletons she thinks I should have a pile of bones with a couple of Skeletons assembling themselves out of the bits. I will try to work on these ideas and see where I end up.

Apart from that I picked up a copy of the Planetary Empires hexagonal campaign map that I want to combine with my already painted Mighty Empires one to make a big map that I have an idea to do a two player campaign with a mate of mine. So I will try to sandwich that into the next three weeks as well. Plus I also have a few terrain pieces that have been lying around for an absolute age that I want to try and knock off as well.......

Think I need someone to slap me and remind me to stay focused on the army plan.

Thanks for reading.

God dammit, you've finished this army in less time than it apparently takes for me to scratch my arse. Or get a unit of goblins painted. It looks great, by the way. Which is also annoying given your speed.

For the TK, there's a nice army blog here that I always liked. It features quite a number of units rising from the sand.
http://z4.invisionfree.com/Khemri/index.php?showtopic=12964

Thanks Az. That link is great. The basing effect he uses is really interesting and definitely would allow me to get some "shape" onto the bases which is good as I intend to just use sand as my basing material and it would be good to manage to imitate dune effects.

HOLY CRAP!!! Those falcons are awesome. Great scheme, and very neat lines. The whole army is very striking, but the falcons stand out to me.

The Eldar look great!! The blending effect you got especially knowing that you didn't do it with an airbrush is spectacular!

That's a very impressive army must look great on the battlefield.

Hope it looks good. I will try to take some pictures once i manage a game with them. Will try to find an opponent with a painted army to make the pictures even better.

You might have to supply both armies in order to get 2 fully-painted forces, the way things often go..

I have been very tempted to do a GrimDork style comic book battle report with some of my painted armies. Play the game out as me putting on various generals hats. But alas I am without the facilities at home to set up a game board. Which is devastating as I have so much terrain painted and ready. Just need the space and the board.....

Dining table while your wife's away? Do you have a mat?

Many a miniature war has been carried out upon the dining table of battle.

If you do a comic style report, please make a nicer one than me so I can steal the ideas

No photos (or progress for that matter) with this update. Just thought I would poke the log so people know I am still about.

I had a game of 40k and Necromunda this past weekend. Didn't bother with the camera as too many unpainted models for my tastes.

I was convincingly beaten in the 40k game leading my Astra Militarum against a Space Marine army. I knew I was in for it when I had the first turn stolen from me and the. In my first turn of shooting not one marine failed an armour save and I only managed a single hull point on a land raider. Things did not improve, although my Lord Commisar showed his worth besting a Librarian and several Marines in combat before heroically burying his Power Axe in the belly of a Sergeant before having his head removed by a Powerfist. Also, my tank commander and buddy Vanquisher showed why they are such amazing tank hunters they are.

My luck improved drastically in the Necromunda game. I took my Van Saar's against a very experienced Cawdor gang (lots of toughness 4 and 2 wound Gangers). We did a scavengers game where it was all about grabbing loot. My opponent came on aggressively which played into my hands as I could avoid the worst of his gang and concentrated in the loot. My Leader won me the game when he charged a Juve who was holding the last of the loot counters and took him out.

So a mixed bag of results. I really need to practice my 40k tactics more or at least concentrate for longer....

In the painting stakes I have all of my tomb kings assembled apart from 2/3rds of the tomb guard unit which I am not sure I will manage to purchase before my wife gets back. So I may not manage the whole army in the time I was allowing. But we will see.

Sorry for no pictures. But thanks for reading.

Hi all, been a little while since my last activity. But I have started to make some progress on the Tomb Kings. However, I have basically accepted that my plan to paint the army before my Wife gets back from Europe is probably not going to happen. I have just lost all sense of drive. I put this down to my regular routine getting mixed up and obviously now having to manage the whole household rather than splitting the duties with my Wife. Well that is my excuse and I am going to stick to it. There is also the fact I am a little hesitant of what is going to happen with Warhammer and this Age of Sigmar. I personally don't put much stock in a lot of the rumors as I feel it would be suicidal both in alienating fans and the tooling costs (or loss of) to discontinue huge swathes of the line. So I wait hopeful that the three armies I have for Warhammer will not be invalidated with the update, nor require much to bring them in line with the next set of rules.

However, I have managed some progress...


Here is my first Tomb King unit finished. My Skeletal Horsemen. They are somewhat drab as I expect skeletons to be. I took a while to settle on the yellow. I wanted them to have the bronze, but the yellow was an after thought and I am quite happy with the addition. You will notice the horse without a rider. It will be for a Tomb Herald that is going to accompany them and act as a little bit of a character hunter.


I have actually painted all of the skeletal horses for the army (this unit and then 10 more for Horse Archers and the 12 required for the chariots). I have decided on a slightly darker skeleton to help stand out from the horses that are a little more sun-bleached. I think it works ok, but I am already hoping to be done quickly as I can feel I will get bored very quickly. There is just not very much variation between the models. But there will be plenty of interest with the Chariots, characters and Tomb Guard, so hope to keep them up my sleeve when I need a break from the stupid rank and file.


A close up of some of the Riders. I couldn't resist giving them a little point of interest by giving them some glowing red eyes. I think it works ok and I really do prefer some evidence of a malign influence rather than just the empty eye sockets that is so traditional. I did the horses too, but they don't show up in the photo.


I knew that I was going to have to base them with sand as they are risen from the desert after all. But I have tried to give the impression of ripples in the dunes. It unfortunately doesn't show up particularly well in the photos (gee I seem to use that excuse a lot). But it has turned out really well considering how easy it was to do. I will take a couple of close ups of the Chariot bases as it is much more obvious on the larger surface. I have also chosen to add a few tufts of grass just to try and break the sand up a tiny bit.

So there you have the small progress I have made so far. I guess I also have done a heap of skeletal horses, but there really isn't much to them.

Thanks for stopping by and having a read. Hope to get some more interesting models up in the near future. But honestly it will be some Skeletal horse archers first.....

Looks like a nice, solid start. The yellow stands out and gives them a bit of visual interest for sure.

Looking good. As a suggestion, you might want to consider edging the bases with a mid-brown or lighter (Graveyard Earth?) so that the bases flow together with one another and the movement tray. I know, rich coming from me.

Maybe an extra drybrush highlight layer on the skeletal and steed's heads to make them pop a little more?

I really like the yellow!

Thanks for the responses guys. In regards to the bases Azazel I totally get where you are coming from, but unfortunately I have a bit of a "theme" going that all of my armies to date, no matter what is on top of the base have the black trim. I know it would look a lot better with a brown (or similar) strip, but it kind of signifies they are my models as they all share the same theme.

Definitely though will be using your idea of a drybrush to the heads of the Skellies and horses to try to bring them out a little more. Just have to bare with me as I won't photograph the models again until the very end. But will definitely be using that idea. Thanks.

So thank you for your thoughts and inputs, but this post is also to add a couple more units to the army. This time the two tiny Skeletal Horse Archer units......


I think they look better than the Skeletal Horsemen as I thinned the black wash down further and it is less "muddy" much prefer the result. Plus I feel they look a little more dynamic and with the quiver they have far more interest. In fact I think they are not bad models with the poses achievable and the little details.


With the Scout and Arrows of Asaph rule I am hoping these guys will be ok war machine hunters, being able to get within range of something and start peppering it with arrows. I anticipate they will act together to maximize the amount of poor shooting to make sure I achieve something. They will range away from the Liche Priests so will treat them as very sacrificial units.


I added a little more dune grass to the bases to try and add a little more color and interest to the scheme and when I go back to dry brush the heads I am tempted to add a little more grass to all the bases.


I feel they look a little better close up than the other Horsemen, which is a pity that I didn't get it right from the beginning. But such is life.


So this rounds out my cavalry element to my army (barring the Tomb Herald on Steed). This is largely due to not counting the Chariots as they are a whole different kettle of fish and are hopefully going to be a centre piece for the army not only due to their size, but because that is also where my Tomb King and Standard Bearer will be located.

So hope you enjoy the small update of my growing Skeleton horde and stay tuned as next up I think (haven't quite decided yet) are the chariots. But I may opt out and try to knock out my small units of Skeletal Archers (I have 3 of 10). Ah decisions, decisions.

Thanks for reading.

I like the red eyes on your skellies. Heck of a time to start more fantasy stuff with this new age of sigmar nonsense, but we can always keep playing 8th!

One question / suggestion, if I may be so bold. Are the tips of the spears black or is it just the picture? Maybe just a little more metal peaking through the weathering. But I'm just nitpicking. Overall very nice and cohesive.

Coming along nicely!

I like the simple yellow weapons. I don't know why, but they really make the models look good to me.

@ Squall, never fear to be bold and make suggestions. Especially as I am being quite lazy with this army and probably need a swift slap to get me focused again. The Spear Tips are actually a very dark bronze. Looking at them, I think they are perhaps too dark, so will definitely add some sort of highlight to lift them up a bit, need to figure out what I do as all the swords in the army are going to be the same bronze too.

Fair enough on the bases, mate. Mine are pretty much the same with desert bases as the only exception

As always, I'm in awe of your speed. The archers are looking good, and the worn yellow on all of them works nicely. I like it even more on the bows!

The more skelies look good, keep it up!

Well it has been a whirlwind trip for my wife. It only seems like she left yesterday and she is due back on Thursday morning my time. As may be evident I am in no way going to achieve this army in the time she is away. I drastically misjudged the amount of free time that I was going to have. But I am more than ready to have my Wife back around. It may sound sappy, but it is amazing how much of a hole there is when someone you spend so much time living in each others pockets is not around.

Plus I have some interesting news (which may or may not interfere with my painting), as some of you may be aware I was made redundant from the position of General Manager from my previous employer just before Christmas last year. Since then I have done what I needed to do to pay the bills and have in fact been working back in my Trade on a casual basis since March this year. Love the work, but it just wasn't scratching the itch. It seems my abilities have left an impact on the industry though and I was approached by two separate companies in the last couple of weeks wanting to somehow get my expertise for a couple of projects. One thing has led to another and I am now about to launch my own Design company that initially I will be burning the midnight candle and running the business after hours where possible and continuing keeping my eye in with my trade to keep the cash flowing until hopefully (big hopeful) I can step up and my business can support itself. So if anyone out there is in need of some Design work with major specialties in the manufacturing industry (plastics, metals, resins etc.) drop me a line.

But enough about my risks into future endeavors. I have had a little progress on the Tomb Kings. But first I will digress, I have had a VERY brief look at Age of Sigmar and I am happy to see that at least initially there are very few units that have been left out (or at least can't be figured out by mix and matching existing units). Therefore, I will be continuing with the Warhammer side of my crazy army plan (yay and boo for different reasons). But since there seem to be no "army selection" rules I will depend on my current lists based on 8th edition as the framework to collect from. Will need to figure out something to do if I look at the new factions that have come out to support the release.

This is turning into a wall of text, so I will stop most of the typing now and onto the small progress I have managed with the Tomb Kings......


So here we have 3 units of Skeletal Archers. In 8th edition I was intending them to wander about among my melee blocks as with their arrows of asaph rule they suffer no penalties for shooting. But in AoS? I have no idea. Then again I don't even know if I can use the movement trays anymore.


As is my style (if you can call it that) the strong yellow has been continued again throughout all these units to help unify the army as well as provide some sort of contrast to all that bone. Oh how I am beginning to hate painting bone already. Probably because I feel I haven't done all that good a job. Its a little too messy, but I am not in any mind to try and fix it.


I have taken the advice from readers about lightening both the faces and bronze on these guys, but I am not entirely sure it comes through particularly well. But please don't think I am ignoring you all.


I may be complaining but I do think I am getting better at the bone compared to my attempts with the cavalry. So that's a good sign as I still have the stand out untis (Chariots and Tomb Guard) not to mention all the characters to go. So here is to hoping I can pull my opinion of the army back with them.


They may be small units but together they certainly add a mass of bodies. As a whole I think the army will look good together, especially arrayed around a large Chariot unit.


I am a lot happier with the bases with the addition of a few tufts of grass. I have continued with the "ripple" affect for the sand which yet again refuses to show up in photos, but I am very happy with the appearance in person, but the little bits of grass help to lift it a little more.

So there you have what ended up being a fairly long post. Lots going onm but still managing a little hobby process which is nice. Next time I post I hope to have either the large block of Skeleton Warriors done, or the non-character Chariots. I haven't decided yet which way I will go.

As always, thanks for reading.

Good work on the skellies.

Good luck with your business endeavor, or ganbatte if you prefer hard work to luck

I can see more of the bronze coming through. It probably comes through even better in person, as photos can do some wierd things to models.

From what I can tell in the whopping two games I played Saturday, shooting is pretty powerful, so you can probably get use out of the skeleton archers.

The latest batch of skellies are looking good! Only a few days and you turn out another 30 models!

Remember, the Skeletons can still be used in WHF 3-8th as well as KoW and AoS - so it just depends on what your friends/group want to play. Hopefully it's not the kind of group that will only play the very latest thing and throw everything previous in the bin, so you can keep on using 8th as much as you need to (as well as the fluff, compositon, etc.

@Archer It's good to come back after a few months and see how much progress you've made. Finishing an entire army and making large progress with another while at the same time sorting out real life stuff. It's pretty inspiring. And maybe a little disheartening when I look at my own meager progress.

Maybe that's why I tend to only check in every month or so. Subconsciously I don't want to know how far behind I am from you.

As for feedback, I think the Eldar look great. I was never a huge fan of the purple and green color combo, but you've done justice to it. Everything is painted quite well. I especially like the effect you've done on the vehicles. That subtle color change really draws the eye. Great job adding one more to the completed list.

The Tomb Kings are off to a great start. Though I say start when you've got practically half the army finished already. Honestly, I am not a fan of the tomb king models in general. The horses look awkward and the weapons/ quivers look pretty chunky. But part of that comes from the age of the models. I hope GW updates them at some point. But AOS, who knows... The yellow is great for a spot color. It does a good job at adding interest. I like your idea for the glowing eyes. It may be too late to suggest, but I don't think red is the right color. It doesn't really match the rest of the army. I think something like teal or a light green would draw the eye better and fit the desert theme a bit more. Just my 2 cents

Speaking of Age of Sigmar, I can understand why you felt discouraged hearing the rumors. I pretty much put my bret army on hold once the more supported rumors started coming in May. It really just killed the drive for the army. However, I personally have decided to just continue playing 8th and maybe playing one of the 8.5 or hybrid 7th/8th editions that dakka people are working on this summer. While I don't think AOS is necessarily awful, the lack of army building and individual customization just killed it for me. One of the reasons I loved WHF so much was the ability to spend hours building lists and making awesome characters with individuality. To step off my box , I hope that you continue to pursue building these WHF armies. You can always break them out with friends and play 8th or 7th or whatever edition you want. And on the plus side you will have every army, so you've have plenty of options.

I think I've taken up enough space on this thread. To summarize simply, great work mate. I love what you've done so far, and I hope you continue your work for 40k and WHF. Keep it up

Hi Freytag93, long time no hear. Thanks for the comments. I appreciate your insight always a good motivator to hear the thoughts and ideas of your peers.

In regards to the eyes I like the idea. Unlikely to change the models I have done. But how about the elites (tomb guard, characters and maybe the charioteers) getting different coloured eyes? Perhaps indicating they have a little more awareness than the rank and file? I think I quite like that idea.

I have no plans to stop the Warhammer side of things. I do plan to keep the themes and lists I already have and collect to them. Especially as there are no "lists" with AoS. I have my first AoS game in a week so see what comes of that.

Will probably be doing another fantasy army next (even up the 40k fantasy armies). Any thoughts? I was thinking dwarves.

oooh dwarves get my vote for next.

Tomb Kings are looking good. I like the idea of the elites and such having different colored eyes.

If you wanted to use an Aqua/Teal-type colour for glowing eyes, it'd be a relatively simple (and painless) process.

1) Purchase Nihilakh oxide.
2) Dab a drop into each eye socket.
3) Done.

That's how I do it with the undead I give glowy eyes to. Sometimes I put a spot of white in there as well as a highlight, but it's not mandatory.




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And Dwarves are good. They're on my list as well, and I've been collecting them over the past few months.

@ Azazelx Where does one get this oxide? I am interested being as how I am fairly sheltered when it comes to different paint brands and products.

I have always had a soft spot for the dwarfs. Would do an engineering guild OR an underground defence force (all iron breakers and miners). Would do both eventually. But not sure which one I would do first.

 Archer wrote:
@ Azazelx Where does one get this oxide? I am interested being as how I am fairly sheltered when it comes to different paint brands and products.

Its a GW technical paint.

Tomb Kings looking good so far, I saw an AoS batrep with them in and they did really well.

Dwarfs sound good mate. As long as it isn't brets so I don't have to compete with you

 Archer wrote:
@ Azazelx Where does one get this oxide? I am interested being as how I am fairly sheltered when it comes to different paint brands and products.

I have always had a soft spot for the dwarfs. Would do an engineering guild OR an underground defence force (all iron breakers and miners). Would do both eventually. But not sure which one I would do first.

Yeah, it's a GW Technical paint, and it's bloody good stuff. It's nominally for copper sulphate-type oxidisation effects (and it's good for that) but it's also good for glowing eyes and the like. There are lots of good reviews and tutorials on using it on YouTube as well.

Dwarfs sounds like a plan. I need to put a few of mine together too.

May have to try that stuff for eyes.

Hi All, I have been neglecting my own work in favor of making a nuisance of myself on other peoples blogs. But I have been slowly working on my skeletons in the background. But between a frustratingly stubborn flu that just wouldn't go away. But I am back and keen to knuckle down and finish off the Tomb Kings. So without too much preamble here are the latest photos of my growing Tomb King army.......

AoS I may choose to use them on foot instead.

[img]https://mycrazyarmyplan.files.wordpress.com/2017/09/img_0509_zpsms8guxjf.jpg" border="0" />
If you look carefully you will see that the 2 empty chariots are also almost completely bronze in the body where the others have the same yellow I have used across the rest of the army. I figured it was an easy way of adding a little variation to the unit without looking too out of place.


The 4 normal chariots. I plan to only run a Standard Bearer as the only command model. Skeletal Champions are just cannon fodder for other heroes and I couldn't squeeze a musician into an 8th edition list.


The crew of the Chariots are almost exactly the same as the previous skeletons. Same techniques and colors except they have a whole lot more bling on them and I have done some light blue eyes to show they are a little more important than the regular foot sloggers.


I am really happy with how they have come up. They are a pretty intimidating group as they have an enormous footprint and will probably be pretty hard to actually position on the battlefield. But with the Battle Standard and General in the one unit I expect them to draw a lot of attention as well as the fact they are so big.


And here we have my unit of skeletons armed with hand weapons and shields. They are pretty basic (as are most of my skeletons) but as a big block of 30 they work quite well. I am really taken by how the faded yellow has come together.


I actually have 2 unit fillers in these units as well, they are tucked into the back to bulk up the unit as I did with the Ogre Kingdoms Gnoblars. But I will show some close ups of them next.


Unit Filler #1, I went down the line of a pile of bones pulling themselves together at the bidding of the Liche Priests. So here we see a guy sticking his head on and another trying to get to his feet.


Another angle of the same filler. I am really happy with how they turned out. The plastic skeletons were actually really easy to shape and get some nice poses.


Similar to the first filler, but this one shows a poor skeleton that has been turned into a pin cushion, but between you and I, he doesn't seem to mind.


Whilst the front guy removes arrows the guy in the back is bending down for something......


Yup, thats right, he is trying to pick up his leg. Skeletons got to have two legs to fight right?


It took a little more work to get these two to not fall to pieces with all the small details. But I think they are so far the best in the entire army.

So there you have my progress after a fairly quiet few weeks. Let me know your thoughts and I hope to be a little more productive over the next month or so. I don't have much left to do now. To finish this army off I have a 30 skeleton unit of Tomb Guard, two Liche Priests, the Tomb King and a mounted Tomb Herald and BSB Herald. So 35 models in total. The finish line is in sight for these guys and I need to start thinking of the next army in line.

Thanks for reading and its good to be back posting my progress.

Getting close to done then! Models look great, I like how much character you managed to inject into your unit filler.

I love the unit fillers. Those are always some of the most fun projects to work on, as you can just do whatever you feel like. The skelly trying to pull the arrows out of himself is pretty great.

The skeletons look great, really like those unit fillers they made me smile.

I really dig the unit fillers. I like the yellow on these guys so much!

Thanks guys, appreciate the feedback. Yeah I think I am going to plan future units around some unit fillers. They are a lot of fun to build. I think I like my unit fillers for the tomb guard are my favourites so far. Hopefully get them up soon.

 Archer wrote:

So there you have my progress after a fairly quiet few weeks. Let me know your thoughts and I hope to be a little more productive over the next month or so. I don't have much left to do now. To finish this army off I have a 30 skeleton unit of Tomb Guard, two Liche Priests, the Tomb King and a mounted Tomb Herald and BSB Herald. So 35 models in total. The finish line is in sight for these guys and I need to start thinking of the next army in line.

Thanks for reading and its good to be back posting my progress.

I was wondering where your army posts were, but then its the middle of horrible cold winter, so I thought that might have had something to do with it.

I love the new stuff. That unit of 6 chariots looks mean as all feth. Really impressive and it'll be a real intimidating unit on the table. I love the unit fillers as well. I've always admired people's unit fillers, but something about the ones you just showed made something click, and now I'm thinking about doing some of my own - probably for Marouda's Undead to start with.

Your next army should be Chaos Dwarves or Beastmen. I looked at your Crazy Army Plan and they're both in there!

I would love to do Chaos Dwarves. But I think they may unfortunately be out of my budget for the near future (unless people know of more affordable but still "Chaos Dwarfy looking" models from another supplier?).

The cold may have something to do with my lack of progress. But that would just be a poor excuse for lazy.

I would love to do Beastmen, but the first army I would want to do is a Chariot-centric Beastman force and I am not sure I want to visit chariots again so soon.

I'm not sure exactly how the prices compare, but Mantic makes abyssal dwarves:
http://www.manticgames.com/mantic-shop/kings-of-war/abyssal-dwarfs.html
They do suffer from being a lot of metal, and restic. A lot of people don't like restic at all. So they're one of the more expensive Mantic armies to collect, and involve extra prep time on the restic parts... but probably still cheaper than GW? Past that, it'll be up to you as to if the aesthetic hits enough points to mach for you.

There's a really good Russian site that sells Chaos Dwarves (their own sculpts) called The Russian Alternative.

I plan on using them when I start my Chaos Dwarf army.

They also sell via ebay as well.

I've got a couple of the Russian Alternative units. They're very nice, and not too expensive.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And Mantic has these, available locally for a bit of bulk troopage.

http://www.gamesempire.com.au/index.php?_a=viewProd&productId=15678

http://www.gamesempire.com.au/index.php?_a=viewProd&productId=14265

The second one seems to retail for 100 pounds, so AU$146 is a pretty sweet deal comparatively.

Gee thanks for all the links guys. I think the Russian alternative definitely is more in line with what I see as chaos dwarfs aesthetics. Although the prices on the Mantic stuff is so low.

Ah the decisions are horrendous. Although I may be working on a deal with a guy for some cheap High Elves and Tyranids....so may be diverging entirely from where I thought I was going.

Cheap is good. I don't love GW elves, but if you're doing them, they'll probably be pretty solid. And Tyranids... would not mind seeing where you went with that.

My old favorite gamestore (can no longer justify the hour drive what with two kids) used to have some KoW starter boxes on the shelves. I got the two half-price Mhorgoth Rising sets, but I skipped over the half-price Abyssal Dwarf starter armies because they were restic/metal/hybrids and they just really didn't go as far as the Dwarf/Undead starter. I have a feeling I'd buy them both if I ever walk back in there but ehh.

Looking forward to more from Archer, whichever army it is

Really like the unit fillers mate. I think some fillers can be very hit or miss sometimes; I don't really like fillers where it seems like a forest or walls are moving around the battlefield with the unit. But these are superb. They are definitely giving me a few idea for my own fillers. Nice work

I dug out all the Tomb Guard to get them ready for some paint only to discover that I am one short. Not sure how I did that as with the unit fillers I thought I had one extra than needed not the other way around. So I am going to promote a spare skeleton and try to dress him up as a tomb guard. Unless the missing one turns up before the end of the weekend. I will call him Jim the work experience kid.

Anyway, on to the important question. I am really struggling to decide which army to do next. I do want to do a fantasy army and I know I have mentioned a couple. But I am actually out of models for any of the options so everything will need to be purchased this time (no more head starts for me). So, if anyone cares to venture an opinion I am happy to take votes......

How about something dual-purpose?

Daemons of Chaos Army - The Rot Carnival

Since I haven't made much progress on the Tomb Guard; although in my defense I am almost finished with the bone (even though their is little exposed bone on Tomb Guard) I have decided to post a single picture of my progress so far. It certainly shows the bulk of the army well and hopefully the wall of bones looks good on the table top.



Let me know your thoughts and hopefully posting a half done army shot will spur me to finish off the last of them.

In regards to the next army I have been forced (sort of) into High Elves. I have managed to secure some very cheap models (including an unassembled Dragon) and I want to do 7 High Elf armies (like the Eldar) so it is perhaps the universe sending me a message. But I have chosen to do the smallest, and most insane of my High Elf armies and will be doing my Caledor themed one. For those of you unfamiliar with the Elf realm of Caledor, its where the Dragons come from and I am planning 2 in a 2,000 Point army (8th Edition) so that leaves very few points for the rest of the army. But that has the silver lining of a very low model count......

Thanks for reading.

The high elves will certainly be interesting. I think that you find the low model count a nice break from the grind of painting the undead. Plus the dragon models are pretty gorgeous.

Also on a semi-related note. Whenever you decide to do dark elves, let me know. I have a ton of left over DE core that I would be more than happy to trade or sell off cheaply to you. I know that they would finally get a proper paint job from you that I could never give them.

Thanks Freytag93, very kind of you to offer and maybe one day I will be able to take you up on that offer of Dark Elves. But it looks as though due to some trades going on and cheap models on offer my next army (High Elves) and the one after (not telling, got to have some secrets) have been decided for me.

I just went back over the posts for this year and counted up my painting so far. All told I have completed 288 models! I thought I had got through a fair few, particularly with the Ogre Gnoblars, Tomb King Skeletons and a stack of Eldar Guardians, but that number has really added up. So to date this year not only have I painted that many models, but I have also finished the Orks off (admittedly it only require a Trukk and 6 Killa Kanz) as well as started and finished Ogre Kingdoms, Eldar and very close to the Tomb Kings finish line. If I can get my butt into gear there is a good chance I can knock over the Tomb Kings and squeeze in the High Elves before Christmas.

Hmmm, may have just identified my target before the end of the year.....

Love your madness!

I just had a read through the whole thread, I am impressed with you work, and level of turnover, even with existing models touched up.

The Eldar, Tomb Kings, and Orks are my fav so far.

I can't wait to see what you do with Wood Elves, more Eldar, and Dark Eldar.

From you're naming structure it looks like Dark Eldar will be divided up by the principle that each unit type is nearly it's own faction within Dark Eldar Society. I love that. It's why I partially invert the colours for different units within the 3 Core armies (Kabalites, Wyches, Cults of Pain).

Nice plan for the elves, much dragon's, so fire, few models. Sounds good!

I'm sure you said before, but why the 7 elf and eldar armies?

The 7 pointy ear armies (and I will do it for wood and dark elves as well) is they were the race that got me into the hobby in the first place (after D&D that is) so I have a fairly sizable collection already that just needs some touch up paint work and will be ready to go.

The number comes from that is how many different Craftworld varieties they have detailed (including a corsair force) and so I modelled the others around that number. So next year I will likely do a Dark Eldar army first, quickly followed by an Eldar army to launch 2016's progress.

Hope that makes some sense.

Sure thing thanks for explaining. Quite mad, but cool nonetheless.

Looking forward to seeing some elves from you, Archer.

@DefiantLambdas thanks for reading and welcome aboard the ride that is me painting armies perhaps a little too quickly. But my wife isn't in the mad house just yet so I think I am ok for now.

I would not have thought yellow would work for Tomb Kings, but it totally does. Well done!!

Thanks Fifty, one of the hardest parts of this process is trying to come up with a colour scheme for the armies. Obviously some are easies than others (space marines) but some I really struggle to get it right. I think in the end yellow has worked pretty well. Do wonder if I needed one contrasting colour to be a little more prominent. Maybe some violet desert flowers on the bases?

I think bright flowers would provide a nice contrast with all the sand and bone. I'm not sure if it would be better to have flowers on all the bases or only important models like heroes and such.

Seems enough people like the idea of some spot colour via some pretty desert flowers that I will need to follow through. Hopefully I can find some suitable ones locally.

I figure I would probably add them to every second model and all of the characters (like I did the grass tufts) that way they are still subtle but dense enough to actually show up.

Hi all,

Just a quick update. Not a heap of progress unfortunately, but I do expect to have the Tomb Guard finished this coming weekend and then I only have the 5 characters to knock off to finish the army. But before the Tomb Guard are finished (of which I only have the Standard Bearer and two unit fillers to complete and the bases, oh and glue the shields on, ok so I have a fair bit still to do....) I have toyed with the idea of "Desert Flowers" to try and add a contrast to the Tomb Kings as has been raised as a way of adding an extra point of interest without having to go back and add paint to so many already completed models.

So please have a look at the photos of the Chariots and some of the Skeletal Archers and let me know what you think of the additions.


Skeletal Archers


Chariots

Thanks for reading and hope the next update includes a big unit of Tomb Guard.

I think the desert flowers look really good, adds that extra spot of colour that was needed.

So I have reached an important milestone in the Tomb Kings army today. I have now finished all of the units for the army and have only the Characters to go. So this update is all about the elite of the army and those that I hope to do most of the heavy lifting......the Tomb Guard.


So here are my 30 Tomb Guard who with the Killing Blow ability and being undead (and being able to raise troops to replace losses) I hope will put serious concerns into the enemy, especially if they have any big monsters or monstrous infantry.



[img]https://mycrazyarmyplan.files.wordpress.com/2017/09/img_0544_zpsrlfj2zdu.jpg" border="0" />
I ended up picking up 5 of the original metal Tomb Guard who make up the front rank (along with a plastic Standard Bearer as I prefer him to the metal one). With a couple of minor conversions they make a nice front rank to lead the newer plastic guys into battle. You can probably see the unit fillers sitting above the rest of the unit. But we will get to those in the next photo.


So here are the two unit fillers, I went against my previous ones and instead of squares of four I went for 4 in a row and what better way to venerate and appease the gods than to carry tribute into battle? So we have the traditional booty of treasure chests and the less obvious tribute of knowledge represented by a selection of books.


I am pretty happy with how they turned out. I used the Halbred arms and shafts from the Tomb Guard plastic kit and they ended up coming together fairly quickly and then I just raided my bits box for suitable loot to stick on top.


The final picture for this update is the unit without the fillers, which shows off the front rank a little better. The guy with the raised sword was the Standard Bearer for the metal originals.

I have to admit I did find the Tomb Guard quite a chore to paint. I am not sure whether it was the sculpts, me fading on my enthusiasm for the Tomb Kings (as always seems to happen at the end) or some other trick of the Universe. But I am glad they are done even if my quality is starting to slide. Hopefully I can get a bit of love back for the undead so I can give the leaders of the army the justice they deserve.

Thanks for reading.

These guys look pretty damned cool. I think the flowers add a valuable bit of spot colour to the force, and as always I find your unit fillers to be really apt and good looking choices.

Those tomb guard are fantastic. Your tribute bases are really great. Awesome stuff, that's my favorite unit for this army so far.

Great work mate. I will just repeat what others have said and point out the unit fillers. I think they look great (as always) and they fit the army theme well. Its hard to consistently make solid unit fillers without falling into a pattern of the same thing, yet you have definitely pulled it off.

Also, the flowers look good. I think they add just enough color to contrast with all the sand and bone and yellow. Can't wait to see what you do with the characters

Thanks for the comments guys. Keeps morale up as the bone is certainly starting to get on top of me. But I may possibly have the two liche priests finished this evening. Depends how hard my training session tonight is......

Flowers are an excellent addition!

Another weekend and another update. I have got my Tomb King mojo back (at least for now ) I present to you the two Liche Priests responsible for the animation of the army and obviously will be my magic support to keep things going and replace casualties.


This guy is the newer Liche Priest model and is finecast. He was second hand and already undercoated, so I didn't need to deal with much cleaning of the model, so I yet again have not had to deal with any of the Finecast horror stories. I am not a fan of the weight of the model. He weighs less than the plastics and I prefer my models to have a bit of weight to them.

I have basically stuck to the army colors again, but tried to make things a little brighter. I have made his robes white instead of yellow though to really have him stand out from the crowd.


I really enjoyed the detail of this model. I was trying to decide if he should be my Hierophant, but in the end the next Priest is far more ostentatious so this poor mummified soul has been relegated to back up Liche Priest.


And here we have the magic behind the army, my Hierophant and High Liche Priest. He is a fair bit more colourful than just about every other model in the army, but I figure that is appropriate since he is the guy who runs the show.


I picked this guy up extremely cheap, but he was missing an arm. But one of the spare skeleton arms fitted perfectly. I really liked the snake hood and wrapped around his staff. A little different to the other priest.


The two priests side by side. One is obviously feeling the years more than the other, but so far they are my favorite models of the army so far.

I have really enjoyed these two and hope my enthusiasm continues for the remaining characters. With these guys being based and ticked off I am now down to the last three. I will do the Tomb Heralds next (one is mounted and one will be in a chariot with Standard. Then that will leave me the Tomb King to finish off the army which I think is very appropriate.

Thanks for reading.

The priests look great! I like that they are brighter than the rest of the army to help them stand out.

They look great, I really like the first one, reminds me of a gumpy old man yelling "get off my sand" lol

Yeah, those priests look very nice. The extra colour (well, white) seems to make them stand out a bit more compared to the others. Also the giant pointy sticks they've got in hand. Can we see a side-by side of the priests next to a unit?

Fancy! Good stuff, always nice to have the leaders ready so as to keep the troops in line (and animated!).

As was requested , here are a few more shots of the Priests with a couple of units. I think they fit in well and still stand out from the crowd.


Here are the Priests with the Tomb Guard, they are unlikely to ever accompany these guys directly as I am not fond of having my spell casters in pure combat units.


I am not sure it would be a good idea. But I think this is more likely where the Priests are likely to function during a game; that is running around the units as individuals. I feel this will give them the greatest flexibility to replenish the ranks where necessary.


Or the other option is to put them into the units of Archers that will hopefully be staying out of direct trouble.


But this guy does look kind of cool in with the Tomb Guard. A pity they can't have some sort of rule to protect any character that is attached to their unit.....

So there you have the Liche Priests in among their army of Skeletons. How do you think they look?

No painting progress today as I spent the afternoon playing a few games of X-Wing, hate to say it, but I think I may be adopting it as another game I play. At least there is no pressure to paint them....

Thanks for reading.

They look great - and they do manage to stand out amongst their forces.

Yep, they work especially well, excellent work!

X-wing is really fun to play. And with a lot of ships you get a lot of replayability.

No pressure to paint, but be aware of the pressure to 'Pokemon' the range, collecting them all even if you don't particularly like a ship or plan to use it. If you get into playing even remotely competitively, you will probably want to get an expansion or two just for the cards. Just for ONE card usually. And that one card will cost on eBay *almost* as much as the ship it comes with so you may as well get the ship too.

Mistakes are very to easy to make and the slope is very slippery.

But it's a fun game and the models look sweet on the shelf

So I have had a very productive weekend. Poked around at the Club's X-Wing Tournament (didn't play as I only picked up my first ever ships today), but now that I am on the slippery X-Wing slope I intend to build my Most Wanted box into the most capable Smuggling Syndicate this side of Tatooine (yup I am a Star Wars nerd through and through).

But more importantly after a long Friday night session and a touch up Saturday night I managed to get this guy done.


He is my mounted Tomb Herald to go with my Skeletal Horsemen who hopefully will deliver him to give a killing blow to a character or two. I envisage him being a bit of a mid level character assassin what with some choice magic items and his innate killing blow ability. He used to be a standard bearer, but I changed that to a spear as it was more useful to him.

I also managed to get this guy done.


This chap is another Tomb Herald and will be the Army Standard Bearer as well as cruise around with the Tomb King to make sure he lasts just a little longer with his Bodyguard abilities.

But I have also been a busy boy and managed to also get this guy finished too.....


My Tomb King, ready and able to lead his undying Legions against the Old World (or world of Sigmar, or any other game he can fit into for all I care). I am pretty happy with him, my brushes quality really started to decline towards the end and I have been holding off changing them since May (as my Wife bought me about 15 brand new very high end brushes, didn't even know she knew where to look for them). But he is done and I think he fits the army very well.

But wait, whats that? Didn't I say the King and Army Standard are going to ride in Chariots? Drum roll please.





As you can see, I have them pinned to loose bases so they can be on foot or in their Horse drawn carts. I did this mainly as in 8th edition it was possible to have the chariot destroyed, but the character continue to fight on foot. So made this possibly redundant modeling choice, which has the nice effect of giving me a little versatility with these two.

But those canny readers may realize that these two models make a special event take place......the Bronze Host of Ka Sabar is now finished! Yay for progress another army down and I think as a unified force they are really effective. But you can make up your own mind.


The Lord's of the army, my Tomb King and High Liche Priest. Between these two my whole army lives and dies, literally, if I lose the Priest the army crumbles and if I lose the King my hitting power is badly reduced.


The supporting cast of Heroes, a back up Priest to help out raising the ranks of the undead and 2 Tomb Heralds to hopefully sort out any living troops.


The Core, which is basically the whole army. Except for the Tomb Guard and Characters. I do intend to one day do another Tomb Kings army and it is going to be all Ushabti and other constructs, honest.


The only Special or Rare unit in the army, my Tomb Guard who I hope will put serious doubts into the enemy with their killing blow.


And the Tomb Kings rode to war......the whole 2,000 points all together for the first time. A lot of bone and yellow, but I am really happy with the overall look. I am very happy to be finished with them and won't be looking to do any skeletons in the near future.

So there you have it. Seven down and I am now going to be moving onto High Elves, from Caledor, so be ready for Dragons and Dragon Princes galore. It will be small and hard hitting and probably absurdly unbalanced, but will be a very compact force. But first I need to look at the new Space Marine Codex and see how I can bring my Iron Hands into line with it. I am pretty certain I just need to add a Whirlwind which I just happen to have ready for some paint (coincidence? nup, I just looked at what models I had and how I could cheaply update the army and the Whirlwind will go well with the thunderfire cannon).

Thanks for reading.

Very nice! Congrats

Quite looking forward to your dragons and dragon princes!

Great work on the heroes, Archer. They definitely stand out when with the regular troops, without looking out of place.

And congrats on finishing another army! It is absolutely ridiculous the work you have done over the past year and a half. 7 armies?! You have done more in your updates than most threads I follow here on dakka.

I'm looking forward to the HE army. I think you will really enjoy painting such a small (and points expensive force). It's always hard when you finish a core troop and realize "welp, there's 5 or 6 points." But now when you finish one model (admittedly a much larger one, but still), you will be crossing off 20-30 or 200-300 points. It's why I have been working on my MCs rather than my little bugs. Though I know it will reach a point where all I have left is 300 little guys to slug through.

Keep up the great work, man. I can't wait to see what you do next.

Awesome work, Archer. Both in terms of finishing off all those characters, and chariots, but also the whole bloody army. I really am in awe of your speed and productivity, and the whole-army shot looks awesome!

Thanks guys, appreciate you stopping by. I figured out a lone Whirlwind will bring my army back to the 2,000 point benchmark, so it is next on the painting table before the High Elves get their turn. Hopefully be able to knock it out quickly as it is already undercoated black with a few details done.

Bloody Iron Hands. That means it's almost finished already!

Another one down!

They look great.

What's your model count for the year?

Cant wait to see the HEs!

Ah I am pretty sure my model count for the year is now 323 models. Those Gnoblars and Skeletons really help things add up. Not to mention the basic Eldar Guardian scheme.

Excellent work Archer your Tomb Kings army looks fantastic.

Looking forward to the High Elves and Whirlwind.

Well I have battled long and hard, but unfortunately succumbed to the flu that has struck my Wife and most of her immediate family down and I took yesterday off work in what I hope is a valiant plan to rest up and not allow it to get any worse. Plus, it had the added benefit (please don't tell me beautiful, intelligent wife) that I could get in and get some quality modelling time in between my eye's attempting to melt out of my head and bouts of coughing that I think I was trying to bring up a lung.

So enough melodrama, I managed to get the Whirlwind finished off tonight and there was even enough space in my Iron Hands carry case to cut a slot out for it. So enough rambling (fever induced I am sure):


Here it is alongside one of the Rhino's. I was a little concerned by my choice of white on the turret, but since the weapon casing on all of the other Iron Hands I had to go with it. I did however, dress it up with my dodgy attempt at a geometrical pattern.


Overall though I am pretty happy and I am really hoping that between the Whirlwind and the Thunderfire Cannon I will be able to knock a hole in any horde army that comes at me and free up the Dreadnoughts to do some damage up close.


I did modify the army to utilize the Clan Raukaan supplement as it allows me to take Techmarines as free HQ meaning that the army is still considered a combined arms detachment.


I am really happy with how the warning badge came out and I added more than a few cheeky kill marks in the hope it will translate to some good luck with the scatter dice.....

So I also managed to get all but the dragons assembled for the High Elves, so will be commencing them shortly, probably start with the Silverhelms (oh and my next post I will throw up the army list for this High Elf army.

Thanks for reading.

I like it.

I have been a little negligent on keeping readers abreast of my progress. But to be honest it has unfortunately been lacking. But I think I needed a break from the brushes before I kick into gear again. I have made serious progress on a Flamespyre Phoenix however and hope to have some pics up by the weekend.

But first I have realized I haven't added an army list for the High Elf army so people can see just how ludicrous the army is......

The Dragon Riders of Caledor

Prince Ageman of Caledor - Sun Dragon, Star Lance, Dragon Armour, Shield

Gruyere the Rash - Dragon Mage of Caledor with The Gem of Sunfire, Dragon Armour

The Proving - High Helm Nemsor, Standard Bearer, Musician, 7 Silver Helms, Shields
Noble Sons - High Helm Hairn, Standard Bearer, Musician, 7 Silver Helms

Legends of Caledor - Drakemaster Kirev, Standard Bearer, Musician, 4 Dragon Princes of Caledor
Pride of Caledor - Drakemaster Mitov, Standard Bearer, Musician, 4 Dragon Princes of Caledor

The Fires over Caledor - Flamespyre Phoenix

Total List = 1,999 Points - 36 Mounted, 3 Monsters

As you can see it is TINY! Obviously this is a list based on Warhammer 8th edition as AoS lists are redundant and I don't know Kings of War well enough to do a different list. It may have serious short comings on the battle field, but has the amazing benefit of only having 37 models to paint to finish it off.

Like the Eldar though I plan on doing multiple High Elf armies, so I am not as fussed about the serious lack of models as I will be able to mix and match later on.

Any ideas on how 2 dragons and some serious elite cavalry will go on the tabletop?

On some other exciting news I have been convinced by my brother (who is a collector only, not a gamer) to paint him up the Primarch's from Forgeworld and took possession of the first two this week. Yes they will get in the way of the army plan and I am not sure I can do them the justice they deserve (anyone interesting in doing a spot of free commission work ;-)

Thanks for reading and hope to have some pictures up soon.

That's pretty awesome in theory. Dunno how it would work in game but it sounds neat

Good luck getting back into the groove (trying to do it myself, at the moment) and with the primarchs too.

So I have been very quiet on the painting front of late. Really can't put my finger on the lack of motivation. But probably something to do with that first world complaint of not having enough time. Which to wax philosophical, I have always found amusing because our 'lack' of time usually comes from us doing something else......I guess we are just too greedy.

Anyway, I have finally managed to kick off the first model in my latest army the High Elves. I picked him up very cheap from eBay (as so many of my models are). I think he has the proper base, but had no flying stand so I "borrowed" some rod from work to help me out. So without further waffle.........the Flamespyre Phoenix:


I am very happy with how he has turned out. He is a very simple paint job, simply blending from brown and dark red through to yellow and white. But I think the model is really spectacular, so I feel a basic paint job is excusable.


It was a bit of a pain to get the blending right, But I feel the stark difference between the feathers and the flames works pretty well.


Obviously I kept the bottom the same as the top, although I tried to darken the body a little bit. The feet and beak work really well as a contrast to the rest of the model and help draw the eye in and provide a form to the overall model.


I really like the eyes. Very simple green with a wash and then a single darker dot with a gloss varnish over the top. In fact I am pretty happy with the overall appearance of the head. Has a little personality.


I struggled a little with the color for the feet. But ended up going for the fairly generic brown, but kept the grey claws to match in with the beak.


I was having a little trouble coming up with what to do for the bases for my Caledor based High Elves and my Wife (bless her) decided it should be lush mountains with a touch of snow. I feel it fits quite well as I am sure Dragons and Phoenix like to live up mountains and they often have snow. I have attempted a sort of Spring thaw look as the snow adds interest rather than the main feature.

So there you have my first addition to the latest army. Thoughts and comments appreciated and thoughts on the base encouraged before I do doing them for the rest of the army/

Thanks for reading.

Damn. That's effective.

I really like it, and you're right about the eye, got some personality.

Thanks Grim. I quite enjoyed painting this guy. Not looking forward to getting stuck into the silverhelms though. Lots of work in saving them from the poor condition I picked them up in from eBay. But so, so cheap.

Wow! That eye is really good, mate. Nice job with the phoenix

The phoenix looks lovely Archer

Thanks guys. I really enjoyed this model. Trying hard to put one of the dragons down and knock out the silverhelms horses.

In a modelling note, I am running two dragons in this army and they are the latest GW plastic high elf ones, so obviously apart from the riders they are exactly the same. Any ideas on how I can change the models up a bit other than a paint scheme? Was thinking of trying to change the ruin that the dragon is leaping off.

That Phoenix is outstanding. Really, really nice, and the base is also a great job - really works well on that figure.

Are there any alternative heads or tails for those dragons? If so, maybe a bitz order from eBay or HoB or something? Or a graft with a Dark Elf dragon or something? Add some armour?

Hi all, this is a very quick update to just check in and let people know I am still around, but have hit a very, very slow patch in the hobby world. Lots going on in life and is leaving me drained and far from in the mood to lift a paint brush. But the good news is I can feel the painting mojo returning and hope to soon be back to full speed.

@Azazel, sorry I didn't mean to ignore your thoughts on the Dragon, all are valid ideas, but I think I may be a little more ambitious and do something I haven't done in a very long time and crack out my sculpting skills and really give the dragon a different pose. Hopefully will have something to show in the near future, but first I want to knock all 20 of the Silverhelms off as they aren't inspiring me much. Then I can get into the Dragon Princes and two Dragons. I am close to having the Silverhelm horses finished and then just need to get stuck into the riders.

However, I have had another modelling distraction looking at me for a little while now and I need to get my act together because I intend them to be a gift to my Brother for Christmas. He is a collector, not a gamer and likes the Horus Heresy lore and I can think of no better present, so I have been a little overwhelmed by these two for a couple of weeks now......


The level of detail is really quite astounding and I am very, very impressed by them. But equally intimidated by the scope of the models. Have almost been frozen with trying to figure out where to start.


Obviously I have left them largely in pieces for better access with a brush and all that. I have managed to make a start on Robute Guilliman. Not sure why I started there, probably as I once upon a time painted probably two and a half companies of Ultramarines for a friend, largely due to how fast I can paint a model to an ok standard when I have my painting head switched on. So I have mounted all the bits on sticks for ease of handling and now I am looking for a decent suggestion for colours. I do want to stick fairly close (or as close as my skills will allow) to the official schemes.

So there you have where I have been hiding, I have been popping in to others blogs to keep me distracted and entertained so I hope I can get back to the productivity of the likes of Para and Azazel.

Thanks for reading.

Neat really looking forward to seeing where you go with this

My two favourite Primarch minis... this ought to be good! Pretty sure I was already subbed, but if not, subbed again!

Are you going for the black armour or white on Horus?

really haven't decided on Horus. Probably why I chose to do Guilliman first. Probably will stick with the black on Horus.

The FW primarch models look so good I just wish they weren't so expensive.

I look forward to seeing what you do with them.

They are going to be fun to paint, just make sure you take your time on them, its not everyday you get to paint a primarch let alone two.

It's taking my time that I will struggle with. I am usually wired to smash through models as this blog attests to. Just need to slow down a bit.

Looking forward to how these turn out...

Have managed some painting in the last little while and feel my motivation coming back. So really hope to hit a purple patch of productivity (got to love some alliteration).

So on the current army front I have now finished off the horses for the silverhelms and their movement trays. I have mounted the riders all on sticks for ease of painting and hope this coming week I will have both units completed. Some pretty pictures of riderless horses for you all:







Pretty standard High Elf colors of blue, white and silver. But I want to keep these guys separate from the other components of the army as I want them to appear as interlopers or ring ins to the realm of the Dragon Princes, so am quite happy for them to be "traditional".

I have also made some progress on my Primarch project and am pretty happy with the results thus far. It has been a steep learning curve and I am questioning the logic of me taking on these models. But enough procrastinating, let me know your thoughts on my slow progress.


The cape took a little while to get somewhere I was happy with and it certainly took a lot of very thin coats of very watery paint.


The base took me quite a while and as my first attempt at marble I am pretty happy with how it came out. Probably wasn't the model to attempt a new technique on, but it wasn't like I had another model that marble would have suited.






I don't think my Brother will actually ever game with these models. But I did leave them so if the need arose they could be pulled off their bases as is intended.



And finally for this update I have the head of the noble Primarch of the Ultramarines and yes I am aware of the morbid nature of putting a drill up his neck......
I have had a couple of goes at it now and think I have settled on something I am pretty happy with. I wanted a fairly pale complexion as it will hopefully stand out from his armor which is shaping up as a pretty drak blue.



Thanks for reading and your thoughts are appreciated.

I like the horses they look great.

That marble effect though is amazing really looks like the real thing

Yeah, fantastic work on the marble!

Yep the diorama bases are excellent, horsies look good too.

Thanks guys. Have learned a lot for that technique and already know how I would do it better in the future (if I ever use the technique again). But for a first attempt I am pretty happy with it.

We had an 8 hour black out last night so I made zero progress on the Silverhelms.

The high elf horses look great, and the marble looks outstanding, especially for a new technique. The primarch is going to come up fantastically.

Hi all, me again.

Just wanted to say that the Scarecrow you have done Grim is a frightening model and looking at your new avatar picture creeps me out.

This update is more tooting my own horn as I have had a couple of people ask how I did the marble effect. Don't get me wrong there are plenty of fantastic tutorials out there, but I figure it can't hurt to show people how someone of my painting skills went about the marble effect. May give people an idea to give it a go and develop there own ideas. So bear with me as I throw a few photos up......

I unfortunately didn't take any photos during the actual model painting stage as I didn't expect it to turn out well enough to bother letting anyone know how it went on, so I knocked out a mock up.

So........you need to start with this........


A white background, but there is no reason that it needs to be white, but I wanted white marble so surprise, surprise I started with white.
Then, you need one of these......


Wait, stop looking at the half built primarch in the background, or the other messy things on my paint tray. I mean the rather old paint brush thats a little fuzzy in the foreground. I chose to cut the bristles down as it was seriously dog eared and felt it help me stipple a little better.


The next step is to stipple on a light grey (I used space wolf grey which I am not sure GW sell anymore). It isn't a whole lot darker than the white, so feel free to go a little nuts. I think the effect is enhanced if you try to be a little random and "organic" as opposed to really even. So just do what feels right. Please note that when doing this stippling you want about as much paint as you would use for dry brushing.


Next you do exactly the same thing but with a slightly darker grey (I used a current GW paint called Administratum Grey). You want to be a little less than the previous color and I tried to see where natural "veins" of color would fit.


You may have guessed the next step, yup, more stippling, this time I used the darkest grey I have this time (another current GW paint Eshin Grey). This time I tried to be more sparing, but as you can see failed and it was quite dark. But it can be brought back from the brink.


I stippled white over again (this can be a good trick if you feel it looks to uniform as well).

So the stippling is now done and it is up for the detailing stage.


Now I use a fine paint brush and using the Eshin Grey again to paint veins. I try to make the lines uneven and a little random. The constant lines on the bottom of the image are the method I used on the Primarch base, but I gave a different concept a go on the top. I think either would work quite well.


Then using the same brush I paint a fine (well try to paint a fine) white highlight along one edge of the dark grey line. Now I decided that it was a little too bold for what I wanted so went back to a previous technique....


I got a very big brush and drybrushed the area with white again. I actually did this to the scenic base as well and feel it went a long way to "dulling" the veins and stippling further and gave a kind of chalky look to the edges of the stone.


Then finally, apply a coat of gloss varnish (I ran the brush over it as it dried to give it that textured grain, not sure it added to the effect or not, but I liked the idea).

So there you have it. Thanks for indulging me as I put up my little tutorial, hope it encourages someone to give it a go as if I can manage an ok result anyone can.

Thanks for reading.

Hang on a moment, you can't just leave a half-painted Primarch in the back of a shot and not show us loads of WIPs!

Cheers for the tutorial.

Thanks for the marble tutorial, may have to try it!

The marble effect looks good. I've used a feather for the veining effects. Something I learned when the whole 'faux finish' fad was in force. Also, try 'floating' some of colors with glazing liquid, to give a sense of depth.

The high elf cavalry is progressing nicely.

Ok maybe I will put a couple of WIP of the primarch up. I am now pretty happy with the armour it was just too dark and wouldn't have suited the leader of the Ultramarines. (So I had to do it again, although I have now figured out a great way to do Konrad Curze in the dark blue and glossy armor when I get to him). I am happy with how the gold is shaping up. Just need to figure out a way to define it better without losing how bright I have it......

So I have caved to putting up some WIP pics. Sort of........






The above photo is me messing around with the gold over the blue armour. I found I kept going back and forth and ended up layering a great many layers to get things looking the part.




Here you can see me starting to add the red and white onto the model.






And finally we see here, the almost finished body of Robute. I am really happy with how he has come together and am soon to assemble the final model and I hope he looks as good as I think. It has taken a while of slow progress to get him to this stage. But think he is worth it.

Stay tuned and soon there will be an assembled Primarch.

Thanks for reading.

Hi all,

Progress from my previous WIP pics of the Primarch and that means some exciting news........I present to you all, my take on Roboute Guilliman, Primarch of the Ultramarines









So there you have him on the small base in all his gaming glory. But since my Brother isn't a gamer per se, he is unlikely to be found on this base very often. So instead, its better to look at him on this one.......











I am very happy with how he has turned out. It took some thought and a few false starts. But I feel I have done justice to an amazing sculpt. Looking forward to getting onto Horus and certainly hope I can get him together in time for Christmas. Although I am going to take a slight breather and get at least the Silverhelms knocked off for the High Elves as I would like to also get that army done before Christmas as well. You never know I may manage to get onto the next army before New Years Eve.......and it crawls........on six legs.........

Thanks very much for reading and your thoughts on the Primarch are most welcome.

Robbie G-man looks great! If you haven't posted him in Showcase, get on that pronto! He deserves to be seen!

He looks superb Archer, excellent work all round.

Thanks for the kind comments.

Have no idea what showcase is. So haven't put him up there.

I meant the showcase forum here on Dakka, I find it's always worth posting particularly good stuff there just so its gets a wider audience and you can get more feedback than just those who follow your blog:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/forums/show/73.page

Cheers Paradigm, will have a look at it. Might be fun to see what the wider community can offer.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Have now posted in the Showcase area. Thanks again fr the link to the forum.

Yeah that's fancy . I especially like how seamlessly the base sockets in, but the painting overall is good and impressive.

Fantastic work Archer. Your brother will be absolutely stoked. You've done justice to the sculpt, and the final result is very impressive. The final piece and composition work really nicely. Great job!

Cheers guys. Appreciate the words. Will try to knuckle down and knock off the Silverhelms, but Horus is calling. Think I am leaning towards the black armour option not the traditional sons of Horus scheme.

Great stuff. You've captured the face detail very well.

Hi all,

Managed to be somewhat busy on the hobby front and here is some of the results.

First up a teaser of something to come, well ok, not much of a teaser its pretty obvious who it is........



And back on to the Army Plan (where in all honesty I have let the Primarch's really derail me). I have now finished 21 of the 36 models in this army. Damn, does that show how stupidly small this army is. Would love to get a game in with them to see if they are even remotely competitive.......


The horses are all mounted now by the Silverhelms.


I stuck with the super traditional Blue, White and Silver approach. although I kept the silver to a more grey look as to not be too shiny.


This lucky regiment has shields as points wise I just couldn't afford to put them on both units.


So here is the poor disposable, shieldless regiment, ready to try and survive the dangers of the world.


The riders actually came together faster than the horses. Probably because they are about a fifth the size......


I like the look of the white lances, really helps them stand out from the unit.


The massed ranks of the Silverhelm charge. Unfortunately from my experiences with the Knightly Order I did a while ago I fear they will prove unable to break big blocks of infantry without some serious luck and help.


But at the very least, they will look pretty good doing it.

So there you have 20 more High Elves to fill my army and I started to play with the Dragon Princes as well. All of these models have been rescues from eBay and the condition of a couple of Silverhelms were terrible and I didn't even try to rescue them, just straight in the bin. But I got them for a steal so wasn't too concerned. The Dragon Princes are in a lot better condition, but still need a bit of TLC before I throw paint at them.

Thanks for reading and hopefully I can get some momentum up leading into the festive season.

Nice wall of elven cavalry! In my own elven dabblings I couldn't get on with the Silver Helms at all paint-wise, those are very impressive! Looking forward to seeing the Dragon Princes as well, some of my favourite HE models!

Looking great Archer. I think you blew the primarch model out of the water. It really looks excellent. Especially the sword, as it honestly looks like the light is reflecting off of it in bands.

The Silverhelms are solid as well. They definitely look great as a unit. That was always one of my favorite parts of WHF, as the big blocks of models just look so intimidating facing off against each other. I'm looking forward to see your take on the dragon princes.

Good luck mate

Thanks guys. Found the Silverhelms pretty punishing to convince myself to finish. Not sure why. enjoyed painting the horses and then just hit a road block with the riders. But they are done now and am just finishing off the repairs to the reclaimed Dragon Princes.

Nice work on the elf horsedudes.

Great work, Archer!

Thanks Grimdork and good to see you around EyeamRai. With the Silverhelms complete I think that takes me to 346 models for the year.....may be close to see if I can hit 365, but we will see what happens.

19 models and I have 16 left in the high elves and of course Horus. So that means I will need to do two models in the next army on the block.

So as can be seen by my neglect of my blog all progress has been slowed to the point of non-existence. I am battling a bad flu again (seems this has been a worse year for my health than I usually expect). Plus I am grappling with what direction to go career wise which is causing a little angst. But I thought the best thing for me to do was to show of the limited progress I have managed to achieve since my last activity in a way to sort of give me a kick start and return to normal operation......so, here is what I have managed recently.


I have a table full of Dragon Princes. Half of them blue and the other half red. The grand plan is that I am having two dragons in this army (as previously mentioned) and therefore, one is going to be blue and the other red. So I figured I would paint the Dragon Princes to sort of show their "loyalty" to one or other Dragon, since High Elves are so political after all.......you can also see the base for Horus in its very early stages in the background of this photo too.


This is pretty much where I am up to on the horses. I decided that since they are elite cavalry all of the horses will be white under the armour. This will help distinguish them further from the Silverhelms whose horses are a mix of colours.


The only things left on the blue horses are the horse bodies themselves and the red gems and gold gem settings. The red Princes will have a similar yellowy fabric (although they will be more yellow and they will have bronze armour rather than iron for the scales. I am also thinking blue gems with a silver setting as an opposite to the blue ones.

And I couldn't leave this update without some progress on Horus. I have really enjoyed the few moments I have managed to spend painting him. I feel there are more defined "areas" on him than Roboute. But I have just not been able to get enough brush time with him yet.


Its a pity that there is so much detail on the back of his head, as once its fitted to his armour you will never see it again. So I thought I would take a couple of photos to remember the details that will never be seen. I struggled and struggled with the head, repainting it I think 4 times and the photos have done a great job of making him appear bug eyed. But I am trying to resist doing it again.........


Here is the wolf pelt pretty much done. May give the gums and teeth another highlight, but haven't quite decided yet. Its pretty basic. But I think it needs to be quite light to contrast to the mostly black armour. Yes I have decided to go with the black armour of the Forgeworld samples as that I think is what my brother would prefer. I hope.


The final update is the cloak. Again, the skulls and chain probably need another highlight. But I will look at that when I get a brush back in hand. I am pretty happy with the reds on the cloak and feel that this is the colour Roboute really needed instead of the white cloak. But not much to do about that now.

So I have not disappeared completely, just been struggling to get much done.

THanks for reading and still holding out hope I can get Horus finished for Christmas and the High Elves done by the end of the year.

Elves are looking good! Should be excellent when they're done! Get well.

Good to see you still around! I've just been going through a similar bit of exile from hobbying. The Dragon Knights are looking very nice so far. Well, that one mount is at least!

Thanks guys. Appreciate the encouragement. Hopefully I will be able to get back on the modelling wagon soon. Really want to finish the high elves and Horus off.

Ok folks, I am seeking some advice. I have been battling away with Horus's scenic base and I just can't seem to get it somewhere that I am happy with it. I was looking for a "sandstone" appearance (although that was a pretty loose brief) and the below photos are where I am currently at........









The big eagle head is going to be my marble effect to make it look like it has been blown off a building above and has crashed into the stairs below, so disregard it for this post.

SO, my feeling is that it is too orange. I was wondering if a bone drybrushing could bring it back? Let me know your thoughts please so I can get a decent result.

Thanks for reading.

Welcome back man. I think adding some drybrushed bone would definitely help bring the stone to the color you want. Though I will say you have a very nice textured look for it right now with the myriad of colors overlapping each other.

Bone should be able to bring it back. Do it in successive layers, though - a really heavy drybrush might feth up the different tones you've got going there.

I'm going to be the awkward bastard that says it looks great how it is! The variety of tones is brilliant, and I think with natural surfaces like that, over-highlighting can kill them pretty easily if overdone. If anything, I'd just make the gravel/grit areas a little lighter, that should lift the tone of the whole piece without altering that lovely look it has.

Really appreciate the speedy feedback guys. Think I will definitely be applying it with kid gloves and think Para may be onto something with the gravel and if I don't think that is enough I can move to the rest of the base. It really is fantastic to have a brains trust of talented painters floating around in the internet isn't it?

I think it looks really nice as it is as well, gives off a nice warm feeling.

I think you should finish the eagle and then see how it looks, dont forget you are going to have a big guy in black armour in the centre which will absorb some of the colour.

That's very true GiraffeX. I think you are right and at the very least finish the eagle head as the white may lighten the whole base further.

Time for another update. My Wife is away on the annual end of school term music tour so I have a little peace and quiet which I hope means I can get a fair bit of painting done. Except I spent a couple of hours going on a run with the pup this afternoon so I guess I am still doing my best to avoid the brushes.

But enough waffle. I have taken on board everyone's suggestions (I hope) and ask your opinions on what I hope (fingers crossed) is the base for Horus all finished off.


I decided to go bright and bold with the shoulder pads that are hidden among the rubble as a nice spot of colour to add interest.


I added a wash to darken the carved lettering and make it pop that little bit more.


I did my level best to maintain the various colours and ever so slight texture that I had on the stairs.



[img]https://mycrazyarmyplan.files.wordpress.com/2017/09/img_0787_zpsy3rcbgs5.jpg/img]
With the Salamander (sorry Para I just can't achieve that awesome darker green you do for your Salamanders) shoulder pad on one side I decided Imperial Fist and Blood Angel could be on the other.

So there it is. I am pretty happy with it. I think once the Eagle head was done I didn't need to play with it too much. So if it is done, plus the head and cape that leaves me with the body to go (so still a lot of work). I have been trooping along with the Dragon Princes and only have the Horse bodies to do on the blue Princes and have done a lot of the rider as well. So hope they may be done (apart from basing) by the end of the weekend.

Thanks very much for reading and the advice.

Coming along very nicely!

 Archer wrote:

I added a wash to darken the carved lettering and make it pop that little bit more.

Wow, I am loving the contrast in this photo. You really did a nice job with the different stone and marble colors (as well as the textures!). Great work mate!

Thanks guys. I am pretty happy with it. Although I have decided (read been convinced) to tone the shoulder pads down a notch. So will be attempting a little "weathering". Well as much weathering as I can try to do with my lack of knowledge on the subject. So brown wash to the rescue....

The stairs have come up really nicely, as has the Eagle's head.

That stonework is beautiful. Looks perfectly real.

Appreciate the comments guys. Especially coming from people who produce amazing work in your own blogs. I am slowly getting through Horus and the Dragon Princes. But am looking forlornly at the calendar. Although I do have a very good break over Christmas starting Wednesday next week so hopefully I can really smash out some models.

Plus my brother is coming down from Brisbane for New Years so has said he would be happy to pick his Christmas gift up in person when he arrives so I have a few more days than expected. So may just make it.

Looking great, Archer!

Hey , I love your idea and hope you see it through (and have enough money for it) but got to ask you a question, what about named characters, especially ones that appear in two groups. For instance, do you plan to include Orion? With a Wood Elf army that big, you shld definitely include him but is he extra to each army, or included in the 2000 points of one?

Thanks for stopping by The_Grey_Knight. I really haven't considered named characters at all. I have never been big on including them in my armies but you have an excellent point for the planned big elf armies.

Therefore, I will probably add the named characters as a bit of a centre piece when I am in need of a little painting boost and they will therefore, be additional to the rest of the army. Always wanted to paint an Orion. Wonder how hard it would be to track down an Ariel model.....

Thanks for stopping in EyeamRai. How are the ogres treating you?

 Archer wrote:
Thanks for stopping by The_Grey_Knight. I really haven't considered named characters at all. I have never been big on including them in my armies but you have an excellent point for the planned big elf armies.

Therefore, I will probably add the named characters as a bit of a centre piece when I am in need of a little painting boost and they will therefore, be additional to the rest of the army. Always wanted to paint an Orion. Wonder how hard it would be to track down an Ariel model.....

If you do decide to do this for the elf armies, let me know. I have an old metal Tyrion that would make a great center piece that I can get rid of for a good price

Back on topic, I can't wait to see the finished piece for the primarchs. I'm sure your brother will love it.

Hi all, have been able to get a little bit of progress done so this is likely to be a fairly pick heavy update, so please bear with me. I have one day of work left for the year so hopefully its a pretty casual day and then we are welcoming a new member to our family on Wednesday, another German Short Haired Pointer (our current one is 3 years old all better after her taking on that snake all those posts ago). So I don't know how I will go juggling the two of them and painting and being an attentive husband. But I will try.

But enough about life and more about hobby matters. I have finally made some more progress on the Dragon Princes and managed to knock off the blue ones. So here they are.......


I am pretty happy with the way they have turned out. They so look a little single colour, but I assure you there is enough interest on the models to allow me to carry it off.


I chickened out of a really involved freehand banner on these guys. I promise to attempt something a little more interesting on the next batch. I think the white horses work really well against the blue armour.


I am a little annoyed the movement tray came out so much bigger than the unit. Not sure what happened there, but its done now and shouldn't make too much of an impact in game terms.

So I now have to do just about the exact same thing on the red unit as their armour is already done, its just the little details and white horses to go. So hopefully with work out of the way I will be able to get them done before Christmas.........

However, the far more exciting news (and the hobby thing that has been taking most of my time) is this.......


Yup, I have made some significant progress on one Horus Lupercal. I am pretty damn happy with where he is at the moment.


I have ended up putting a little dark (scaly) green onto his shoulder pads and greaves to add a subtle point of colour difference to all the black.


Which really isn't that obvious when you look at it as a whole.

But this is all a tease as I have managed to get Horus altogether and for the first time here is my take on Horus, just in time for Christmas and I am massively relieved about that.

















So again, like Robute before him I was stretched to my limits and I think I may have burned out in the end with him. I got to a point where I just had to say enough was enough and he is done. But saying that I am pretty happy with the final result. I am really happy with the cape, wolf pelt and base. I feel I needed something on the weapons. But couldn't tell what. Now I just need to figure out how to package them for their long trip north.

Kudos for those who could get through the wall of photos and I look forward to your thoughts.

Thanks for reading.

Good stuff! Really like those Elves in particular, and Horus looks great too.

I agree with Para those Elves are really nice, I really like the blue and the white of the horses goes really well together.

Horus is looking really good as well, very impressed

Thanks guys appreciate the comments. I have been remiss and it snuck up on me (although I made sure to spoil my wife). But Merry Christmas everyone. Hope your festive season is full of excitement and time to reflect and recharge. Hope to get more progress soon.

Merry Christmas bud,

Wow those cavalry units look fab. His self is looking brilliant, nice work.

Great work on Horus, Archer. He looks fantastic. If he's not already headed up North if you're looking for something to do with/to the weapons you might consider a thin wash or two of Corellia(sp?) Green to set them off from the armour and also tie back in to the subtle scaly green on the graves?

I have to say that those Cavalry have turned out brilliant as well. Really impressive work, mate!

So we are soon to see out the year that was and I have managed to scrape in a final update to see out 2015. I have now finished the red Dragon Princes which now leaves me the two dragons to finish off the High Elf army. So here you are, the Red ones......


I think I prefer the blue Dragon Princes, but the process was almost identical. Just different colours.


The White Horses really make the models though as a stark contrast to the red armour.


The two units side by side. In smaller games I would probably combine them together.


I am really happy overall with how they have come together, they look very different from the Silverhelms and will hopefully tie nicely in with the dragons when I get around to it.

I am well placed now to finish off the final two models before I am meant to go back to work. Although the new puppy is taking a toll on everyone, including our poor 3 year old dog whose world has been turned upside down.

But I would like to wish everyone a happy New Year and a heartfelt thanks for stopping by and pushing my projects forward. Here is to a productive and successful 2016.

Thanks for reading and see you in the new year.

Both red and blue armoured Princes are fantastic! Really, really good stuff!

Those Dragon Princes look really nice together, really looking forward to seeing them with their dragons

They look spectacular, impressive display on the field.

Happy New Year everyone.

Hope you all ushered in the end of 2015 and the dawn of 2016 in some truly heroic and spectacular fashion. We hosted a small gathering where we discovered our home is not suitable for 18 month old twins who decided our books needed to be rearranged on the ground amongst many other things. But we did learn that our three year old German short haired pointer is truly the most amazing dog alive as we suspected as the little girl was pulling on our dogs tongue for a lot of the evening and there wasn't the slightest growl or issue. . The new puppy hopefully will learn a thing or two.

But enough real world and a brief review of how the painting went in 2015.

- grew the blog from 6 pages of rambling to 16 pages.
- painted an ork trukk and 6 killa kanz to finish the orks off
- painted from start to finish an Eldar army, Ogre Kingdoms army and Tomb Kings army
- painted a whirlwind to bring the Iron Hands in line with the new codex
- did large group of forests and paper mâché pipe terrain
- painted a Phoenix, 20 silverhelms and 14 dragon princes to almost finish a high elf army (just missed one and a half dragons)
- painted 2 Primarchs

So I have been a busy boy and I was surprised how much I had actually completed. So my goals for 2016 are:

- grow the blog another 10 pages (need to post more)
- finish the high elves off
- after them I would like to get 4 complete armies in a calendar year. Almost did it last year. So this year I will try again.
- play more games, fantasy, KoW, 40k, AoS, X-wing, not fussed what just more games
- complete either another blood bowl team OR marienburg warband for mordheim

So plenty of ambition which I think is healthy. And I like having a list that I can use as a check.

Thanks for reading and wish me luck.

EDIT: I take it as an amazing sign that this post rolled me onto the 17th page. I will interpret that the spirits are with me in my cause.

A productive year, and good luck for the next! Any idea which armies are on the list for this year?

Well after the High Elves it's already been decided to be Tyranids. My wife would like to see a really lurid colour scheme; I think she suggested pink and orange. Could be a really startling scheme. But could be hard to make work.

Beyond that I was going to put it to a vote. But after the Nids will be another fantasy army so that is the only limitation.

Great work Archer. The Red Knights look fantastic, and very cheeky of you squeaking them in before the end of 2015! Good luck with 2016's goals. Though completing 3 and 3/4 armies in a year is still a pretty amazing feat, you have to admit!

Just took a read through your blog. I absolutely love everything you've done! I adore High Elves and yours are so amazing. I haven't had anytime for modeling in the past 6+ months as I have an attachment aka newborn baby, and your blog is really lighting a fire under me. I'm really itching to pick up the brush again and start working on the massive pile of unopened boxes of models.

Super excited to see how you get along this year. Best of luck and happy painting! I will be following you like a creepy fan.

Happy New Year!

Lots of ambition, and lots to look forward to, this is going to be a great year.

Fantastic stuff lately, that Horus is awesome

I really like your blue dragon princes (the red ones are cool too, but I like blue more so..yeah), were those black with blue highlights or is their darker color a really dark blue? Whatever you did, it looks cool and I kind of want to steal it for my infinity Pan O

Thanks everyone. Welcome aboard bunnygurl. Hope you can get into the painting groove. We haven't any children yet, but have added a new puppy to our animal collection and she is keeping us on our toes and sleep deprived.

I to prefer the blue guys Grim, the red just didn't work as well as I hoped. They start as a very dark blue. Old GW paint called midnight blue. Then three successive highlights of blue.

Will be picking the brush back up today and hoping to get the first dragon (who was half done at the end of last year) finished soon.

Thanks for reading.

Howdy all,

I have been trying to get the first dragon finished off, but unfortunately I allowed myself to get distracted by assembling the second one. Below are a couple of comparison photos of the two dragons (and yes the one with paint is literally a rider and some snow on the base away from being finished).


So they are pretty shonky photos, but you get the idea that the second dragon is rearing up. Note that the rock it is standing on is the same height (roughly) as the plastic one supplied with the dragon. So it is a fair bit taller than the first one.


I have made modifications to the wings (bent them in several places and have them pitched at a higher angle), the head has had a couple of changes (its jaw was broken and closed a little and the neck twisted so its looking down and to the left) and obviously it is rearing up on the rock rather than leaping off. Oh and I have bent the tail around with 5 seperate cuts....

So hopefully they will look different from each other apart from the different paint jobs.

But.....

The main reason for this post is chasing some Tyranid models (as they will be the next army on the painting table). So if anyone has any of the following are willing to negotiate a deal (probably be easier if you are in Oz) let me know.......I would prefer no paint if possible, but I am happy to see whats out there.

Tervigon (this will be converted to have the Miasma Cannon)

3 Venomthropes
3 Pyrovores

1 Tyranid Warrior with Lash Whip and Bonesword (yep, one measly Tyranid Warrior, I have the other 11)

2 Tyrannofex's (one will have a Rupture Cannon and the other will have a Fleshborer Hive)

Thanks for reading and hope you like where the Dragons are at.

Happy New Years, mate! I hope the year treats you well. It has certainly been a treat to be able to follow this blog for the past year. It's pretty amazing the amount of work you can get done in 12 months.

 Archer wrote:
- play more games, fantasy, KoW, 40k, AoS, X-wing, not fussed what just more games

If you have any interest, I would recommend Dropzone Commander. I just started playing DZC this year, and I love it. It's a different scale, which mixes up your painting routine, and the rules are really solid. If you have a community near you, I would give it a try

As for the dragons, nice work on the conversion. They definitely look like different models and not just the same dragon copy-pasted. I'm looking forward to seeing what you role out for 2016. Especially the nids, as that is my main army! If you go with pink and orange, all I can say is that at least the paint scheme will be interesting

Agreed those dragons are real nice, the near finished one is superb, and the other definitely looks different enough.

Very much looking forward to seeing what you are upto in the next year.

The dragons are looking ace - particularly as two distinct models from the same kits!

Thanks all. I still have some green stuff to smooth out and add again as a top coat. But it is almost ready for me to start painting.

Need to get back into the rider and then I can show off the first dragon.

Hope to find some Tyranids really soon so I can get into them. Then again I have 80 odd termagants to get through already in stock.....

Forgive this post as it will be a little bit of a photo bomb, but let there be dragons.......or at least one at this stage:


I was a little concerned initially that the mage blended into the dragon (which my Wife pointed out to me). But I kind of like the fact they are integral to each other. They are both creatures of fire and from certain angles it looks like the wings are sprouting from the mage rather than the dragon.


I went for a sort of render look for the base rather than it being solid stone as it allowed me to get another colour onto the model.


I was going to do a similar blend that I did on the Phoenix, but thought better of it as I wanted the models to not look like they just copied each other which as large winged monsters i was afraid it would so I went with a semi glossed look to the membranes.


I chose blue to add a little difference to the model (and ties in with the Blue Dragon Princes slightly). I also experimented with a different way to do gems on this guy and I think it worked really well considering it only takes three paints to do.......


I stuck with the reds and golds of the Dragon Princes as I figure this is the leader of that particular group. Although I went with red gems rather than blue ones.


Not a very steady photo, but it shows I went with a green eye like the phoenix and glossed it up a little.


I am happy with the base and am really impressed with how dynamic this model is compared to some of the dragons of the past that were all exactly the same. Really keen to get the Dark Elf Dragon now......


In all its sweeping glory, I went with almost a complete copy of the Dragon Princes with a yellow underside and Red scaled armour. I chose to apply a gloss to the claws and horns to try and get them to look a little alien and stand out from the matt scales.


Here are the Red Dragon Princes and the Dragon.


I think they will look quite good charging across the table, until a cannon sorts out the Dragon.


This is the shot where it looks like the wings are sprouting from the Mage. I don't mind that too much at all.


So there you have my first of two Dragons for this army and I am now one Dragon away from finishing off the High Elves.

Which is important because it looks like Azazelx may be concoting some sort of painting motivation scheme that I want to get in on the ground floor for as I need a boost to motivation when I look at all those Termagants ahead of me.......

Thanks for looking and as always let me know your thoughts.

Beautiful work sir.

So I have finally finished the second Dragon for my High Elves and I have a lot to get through so won't bore you with idle chatter (this time....)


I am REALLY happy with the reposing and most of the paint. It has been a long time since I worked with greenstuff, but I enjoyed it a great deal so am planning to continue into the future armies.


I lost my way a little with the Lord's colours, but he is such a small part of the model I figure I can get away with him looking a little hodge podge. Plus he has a massive shield to hide behind.


I went for a more bronze rather than gold for the armour and I think it matches the scales and skin a lot better than pure, bright gold would have.


I figure that as Dragons age they get "cooler" hence his scales have darkened and underbelly has lost the youthful yellow of the previous dragon.


I had to put big slits into the wings to curl them like I have and I am happy to report between the green stuff and paint the joins are almost invisible.


Really happy with my new gem technique so for the bulk of models its going to become my go to formula. At least until I run out of the paint I am using.

So there he is, a different colour and a fairly different pose from the other dragon. Looks a bit more regal I think, surveying the field like a canny general unlike his hot blooded brother who is diving into the fray. But of course this means I have now finished this army and its time for the full army shot........


Its a truly tiny army and I would really like to give it a go, maybe not against a horde army, but then again, they tend to have poor leadership.......


I have played with the idea of combining the Dragon Princes into a single regiment, can always do that if I find they are too vulnerable in the smaller units I suppose. But I think the enemy has bigger things to worry about.


So the Lord of the army on his faithful steed.


Somewhat dubious magic support from the Dragon Mage, so I think I will just play him super aggressive, at least until I get sick of him catching cannon balls.


The faithful core of the army, my two units of Silverhelms, I figure each will be supported by a group of Dragon Princes for mutual protection.


The Special choices, I have high hopes for these guys, but at least they will do whatever it is they end up doing looking good. I mean isn't that what its all about?


And finally, which is ironic as he was the first painted, is the rare Flamespyre Phoenix. I can't even remember what his rules are, so good luck to him when I take him to battle.

So there you have it. The 8th army down and I am moving back into the future and as I have said it is going to be those that crawl (and scurry and jump and lope) the Tyranids........

Which brings me to this:


I knocked this test piece out in about 15 minutes. What is the general thoughts on the colour scheme (I only realized after that it is pretty close to my Eldar one. But I like those colours).


I want to give the weapon symbiotes a different scheme to make them really obvious as different creatures, especially as some of the creepy devils have eyes of their own.

Would really appreciate some thoughts on the scheme as I want to get cracking on Az's tale of gamers and I am already half a month behind. (my next post will include the army list as tradition dictates).

Thanks for reading.

What a fantastic army! Awesome work!

I like the nid scheme, the only thing I'm not sold on is the glossiness of the purple. I would say have either the carapace or the flesh glossy, but matt down the other one. That's just nitpicking, though, it still looks really cool!

I think your elf army may be my favorite Archer army to date. Great theme, super elite force of elven riders, dragons, and even a freaking phoenix. Great stuff. I really like the color choices too, striking and interesting for sure.

I think the gant looks fine. It's a good shade of green and the spots and purple make it look pretty cool. As long as it's not a pain to paint

The army shot looks really cool Archer, great to see all the models together.

That Dragon army looks fething amazing. Both dragons are really bloody impressive and I'm constantly amazed at how quickly you turn out such fantastic looking models and armies. Thoroughly impressed!

The 'nid on the other hand... if I'm honest, the scheme looks a little bit garish to me. It might be the super-bright green, or maybe it's the combination of green and purple... maybe both - too much brightness and contrast at once?

Yes it seems I have missed the mark on the Nid scheme. On another forum there isn't much support for it either. Therefore I am having to rethink.

I want to achieve a darker skin tone and bright armoured plates (which I didn't do so well with this scheme). I am thinking along the lines of: dark grey, almost black skin with bright orange armour. I think I have seen it done somewhere before. Thoughts?

Very cool dragons. I really like the test scheme for the kids too.

Keep posting cool stuff and I'll help you achieve your goal of getting 10 more pages on the plog!

EDC

 Archer wrote:
Yes it seems I have missed the mark on the Nid scheme. On another forum there isn't much support for it either. Therefore I am having to rethink.

I want to achieve a darker skin tone and bright armoured plates (which I didn't do so well with this scheme). I am thinking along the lines of: dark grey, almost black skin with bright orange armour. I think I have seen it done somewhere before. Thoughts?

Do you have Dawn of War 2 by any chance?

So I did a couple of quick and very dirty samples. I like both but will reserve my opinion so as to not influence people......

I have stuck with the gun being a different beast and therefore, painted it a different scheme.





Thoughts?

Thanks for reading.

Just be aware that this orange/black grey combo will make the tyranid underneath the carapace hard to see.

Of those two I prefer the black carapace/red underneath. If you like a darker underside to the orangey carapace you could go for like a burnt cadmium red/dark chestnut. You wouldn't have as much of a traditional complimentary colour issue causing it to be garish, and the deep red would probably look quite desaturated compred to the brighter orange. Go brown for the shading of the cadmium red/chestnut and to a yellowish orange for the carapace if you want to increase the contrast. That combo would also look reasonably organic/naturalistic to a degree as well.

Just thinking ideas out loud!

Oh I did once upon a time have Dawn of War 2 and I take it you are getting at the cool little army painter function?

yes, a cool easy way to try out a bunch of colour combos

I definitely prefer the black carapace. Was thinking orange as the base, brown as the shade and a lighter orange as a highlight. Then black shell with a very light grey highlight and MAYBE some spots, maybe.

That works. With the black you can go for the yellowish spots that you had earlier and have it look great. Hell, you could (bear with me here) fleck yellow/mustard/ochre spots on with a toothbrush from above and it would probably look awesome. You know how people do blood spatter? Like that. But with yellow on the black(ish) carapace.

Wow, that elf army looks so good when its all together. Small, elite, and hopefully deadly Great work on the armor especially. The bronze color looks very interesting.

I'm glad you changed the color scheme for your nids. I really disliked the purple and green scheme. But I think the orange and grey/black looks a lot better.

Looking forward to see how this army comes together

I like what AZ said, try it at least. But black carapace and orange bits.

That Pointy ear bunch look amazing, beautiful and awesome all at once. Very nice.

The Nids, well I agree with everyone else the Black on top with the Orange below. Going to be doing some nids soon myself and I will be going all pearly metalicy insect type thingy on them. I really like the idea of the yellow spots, sounds very interesting. Got to do a test on it anyways.

I will be running a test run on some termagants for my colour scheme soon. But we have had an interesting day in the life of my Wife and I which could have far reaching consequences in the medium future and on top of that I am back to work officially tomorrow. So I expect to be exhausted this coming week. But since I want to be a part of Az's tale of gamers I will try to solider on.

But as tradition dictates, here is the list for the upcoming Tyranid horde:

Hive Fleet Acidica

HQ
Mother of Contamination - Tervigon with Toxin Sacs, Shreddershard Beetles and The Norn Crown
Mother of Poison - Tervigon with Toxin Sacs and The Miasma Cannon

Elites
Harbingers of Venom - 3 Venomthropes
Bringers of Poison - 3 Venomthropes

Troops
Heralds of Contamination - 4 Tyranid Warriors, 1 Venom Cannon, 3 with Deathspitters
Bringers of Rot - 3 Tyranid Warriors, 2 with Devourers, 1 with Barbed Strangler
Poison’s Envoy - 3 Tyranid Warriors, 1 with Venom Cannon, 2 with Death Spitters
Leaders of Corruption - 3 Tyranid Warriors, 2 with Spinefists, 1 Barbed Strangler
Lords of Decay - 3 Tyranid Warriors, 1 with Venom Cannon, 2 with Deathspitters
Poison’s Consorts - 3 Tyranid Warriors, 1 with Lash Whip and Bonesword, 2 with Rending Claws

Heavy Support
Father of Contamination - Tyrannofex with Toxin Sacs and Acid Spray
Father of Poison - Tyrannofex with Toxin Sacs and Rupture Cannon
Contamination of Worlds - Toxicrene

So you may have noticed the running theme of Toxins and Acid. The idea behind the army is that the Hive Fleet only seems to attack the most polluted and toxic of worlds and this has started to show disturbing effects on the creatures as a whole. Only the largest beasts seem able to withstand the pollutants on some of these worlds for any length of time and therefore the only Gaunts seen are those birthed from the Tervigons and they usually expire from the harsh environments quickly anyway. Hopefully the theme comes through in the list.

Thanks for reading.

So I have made some more painting progress and would appreciate some thoughts on the colour scheme before i launch full scale into far too many Termagants. Let me know your thoughts.






So I am happy with the carapace and the mottling and I like the orange skin tone. Obviously if they pass muster I will neaten them up a little. But what freaked me out is my Wife insists she can't see a difference between the yellow speckles and the orange body. Now its genetically impossible for her to be colour blind, so is she right and should I choose a different skin colour (I am not going to change the carapace, I like the effect).

Or is she crazy like I keep telling her and I should forge ahead with my Hive Fleet?

Thoughts and comments are encouraged and appreciated.

Thanks for reading.

Carapace looks great! I think the orange body could do with being a little darker and more 'natural-looking' to contrast with the striking, alien carapace.

I *am* somewhat color blind but I'm pretty sure there's a difference between the yellow and orange. It's one of those light on dark and light on light things... making them blend a little. But I still see two colors.

I agree with GrimDork. I can see a pretty clear difference between the yellow and orange. I would say go full steam ahead and use the scheme for the whole army.

I am moving forward on the colours and have decided to break up the termagants with the big beasties to save my sanity.

I have 86 termagants that I am painting for the tervigons to spawn "just in case". Which in turn allows me to play in larger games if I ever felt like it.

I will try a brown or flesh wash over the orange to see what that does compared to the neon orange and see which one I prefer.

Thanks for the comments. I will pass onto my wife she is colour blind ;-)

I think they look great, because of course I do. There's also a clear distinction between the yellow and orange.

Your wife might have some kind of very specific colour processing/adjustment thing with those specific shades on that specific background, like "The Dress"


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_dress_(viral_phenomenon)


I (incorrectly) see a white dress with gold bands. My wife (correctly) sees a blue dress with black bands. I was able to change my perception of it (temporarily) by printing it out, seeing the blue/black, and then the image onscreen changed as I looked at it - freaky!

Yeah I think I always saw the white/gold.

So inspired by Azazelx's tale of 33 Gamers I have made some good progress on the Tyranids after a couple of false starts on the colour scheme. But i am happy with the look now and hopefully I can keep the momentum into February. Without too much fanfare I give you the start of Hive Fleet Acidica.


So I have managed to get 22 Termagants, 3 Venomthropes and a Toxicrene painted. I think the Black and Orange works quite well and helps the green stand out. Its a simple scheme, but the more I paint Tyranids the more I realize the lack of "equipment" like belts, pouches, holsters etc. makes them actually pretty basic models to paint. Really lend themselves to drybrushing and washes.


It's quite a creepy army with all the tentacles floating around. I need to still get another three of these slimy fellows.


The spots on these guys are a little larger and more washed out as I tried a slightly different technique. Will go back to the original for the rest of the army as I don't think it looks as good.


Seems like such a waste to be painting heaps of these little guys in the hope they get spawned onto the table. But rather have them if I need them and unlike many of the other armies they will allow me to have larger games if I needed to (especially as Tyranids seem to have a hard time allying, something about trying to eat everything I guess).


Really happy with how they have come up in the end. Was well worth doing a few test runs to select a paint scheme.


I have gone with a fairly basic basing scheme, but have tried to indicate a toxic environment with nasty puddles of who knows what on the bases.


The first big ugly of the army and he is pretty damn ugly. But with the tentacles and all he is a pretty impressive model and I really enjoyed painting him. Did start to consider if I should dump one of the Tyrannofex's for a second one of these guys but decided against it.


The green areas showing through his armour plates really does a good job of breaking up what would otherwise be a fairly dull model.


The aerial shot, possibly one of my favourite models to paint so far. Not sure why.


A nice size comparison, I will do this again when I get a Tervigon, Tyrannofex and Warrior finished to really show off the size differences.

So there is my start to the Nids. Pretty good considering I took so long to get that Dragon finished. So the end of January and I have finished 27 models. Running at almost a model a day which think is pretty good progress. Hope I can keep it up, just need to stop looking at the rest of the Termagants (shudder).

Thanks for reading.

Very speedy work! Not sure I've seen one of those big tentacley fellows before, he looks terrifying!

Looks brilliant, love the scheme, just spot on for bugs, makes them look stunning as a collective.

And yeah, never seen that big fella before, really like him, terrifying and ugly, but going to have to get one.

Man the 'nids got all cthulhuy since I've been away, not bad.

And your scheme is freaking awesome, really gross, excellent work

The green bits on the big gross dudes are especially awesome

Love that scheme. The mottled yellow on orange flesh looks wicked.

EDC

Thanks guys. Really appreciated. The Toxicrene was a "second wave" release from GW. His rules came after the codex, in white dwarf.

I think it was a sort of an admission they had stuffed up with absences in the codex so this guy (which is a dual kit) came out after and so did the drop pod thingy (also a dual kit). This guy is super poisonous and can even tear tanks to pieces due to some strange rule about attacking weak points. Think he would be great for sorting out a wraith knight in close combat.

He looks very cool Archer, your Tyranid army is progressing very quickly. I really like the scheme you ended up going for.

Archer, great work on the nids. I'm still not a huge fan of the orange and green scheme personally, but I think your execution of it is good. The slimy brain bits on the toxicrene are superb!

Also as a side note, I am not surprised some posters have not seen the toxicrene before. As a nid player I've had a couple experiences running it. While the attacks and ID are great at killing MCs and GCs, the problem (as always for nids) is mobility and armor. The toxicrene only has a 4+ AS, and no rules to help it move more than on average 9" per turn. The only transport that we have to get it across the board is a spore pod, which means that the toxicrene wont be able to assault until the turn after it comes in.

In my experience, it is deadly against opponents who have never faced a toxicrene before. But once they realize what it can do, it gets shot off the board relatively quickly with all the high S weapons that are in 40k nowadays. Which is a shame, cause its such a beautiful model.

Back on topic, keep up the great work mate

Thanks for the input. I figured that he would have a hard time surviving once people were aware of what he can do to things with a toughness value. But I am hoping that along with the 4 other big beasties that high strength firepower will either get spread around meaning they all get a chance to do something or only one big big buys it a turn......

I really like that shocking orange coloration, mixed with the black and green. Excellent 'nids.

That's one hell of an impressive start to the year, Archer. The scheme has come up really well, too - kudos to whoever came up with it!
Actually, that almost-luminous green pops really effectively against the ruddy orange and the black as well.

 Archer wrote:
Thanks for the input. I figured that he would have a hard time surviving once people were aware of what he can do to things with a toughness value. But I am hoping that along with the 4 other big beasties that high strength firepower will either get spread around meaning they all get a chance to do something or only one big big buys it a turn......

Now you're thinking like a nid player

That's really the strategy that I use when I play. Whether I play huge swarms of the little guys or MC monster mash, I try to keep everything as cheap as possible. If you put enough models on the table, some of them will eventually make it to enemy. One thing that helps a lot is having multiple waves of threats. For example, when I run big swarms I cover my side with tons of cheap troop choices. But I also keep things like trygons, mawlocks, raveners, and spore pods full of angry MCs or devilgants. When they start coming in turn 2, it forces your opponent to have to choose what to shoot: the immediate threats in front of him or the scary things at midfield.

Just a quick cheeky update. Wondering if anyone out there has any Tomb Kings they are interested in offloading? With Games Workshop discontinuing the line I always wanted to do a second tomb kings army. But unlike the other one I have done this one was to have a lot of Ushabti, Bone Giants and Necrotect. So, if anyone has any of those three unit types I would be interested to have a chat to you. Not picky about condition.

I have none of the new things and shipping would be brutal anyway Good luck on your goal!

I would definitely check out ebay. I check about once a week to see if there are any good deals on armies, and it seems like a lot of people are still trying to unload their TK armies. Maybe you'll find what you're looking for.

So I have had a pretty good February on the hobby front. Thanks largely to that looming deadline of Azazel's monthly painting challenge. Such an awesome motivator to keep things moving. So I have a group shot over on his challenge page, but the closer shots will continue here as normal. I have been pretty quiet on the forum front as is becoming a tradition as life seems to be very up and down at the moment, looks like enormous changes are afoot for me so could be interesting.

But onto the models, again this month has been about pushing Hive Fleet Acidica towards the finish and alas I won't be able to finish off the Nids as quickly as I had hoped. Mainly due to these guys.......


What's frustrating is that in a 2,000 point game (or smaller) they aren't officially in the list. They are there to cover the Spawns of the Tervigons. I would only put them in the list proper for bigger games. So I am spending a lot of time on models that may never see action......but if I don't have them the Tervigons lose a massive advantage. Ah catch 22 and all that.

So I decided I would break up the Termagants with a couple of the Big guys so first up is the leader of the Swarm a Tervigon with the Norn Crown.


Which gave me a suitable excuse to play with some green stuff and change the head of this Tervigon to be pretty different to the standard which you will see when I get around to painting the other one........


I tried to make the nasty, pulsating sac stand out without being too garish and am pretty happy with how it turned out. It is actually a pretty horrifying model when you look at all the detail up close. My Wife is certainly not impressed by this army.


I am pretty happy with how the colours have come out. Although I did start to rush the model a bit to get it done by the end of February which was perhaps a mistake. I had an epic painting session with a good friend and didn't end up getting home until 4am which helped a lot in the painting progress stakes.


The first of the big hitters. This Tyrannofex has a rupture cannon and will hopefully be my main anti armour go to. Will probably mean he is going to by the farm early, but that just means another big, horribly gribbly is going to get a little closer.


I think the Cannon came up better than the actual bug as the Black and Orange doesn't scale up as well as I had hoped. But enmasse they look pretty good regardless.


Still need to acquire this guys partner in crime and have begun to think of ways to make him look different so I don't have two identical bugs (apart from different weapons that is). The second Tervigon is quite different as the head is stock and its in a more "dynamic" pose if that is possible for something so big, so may do something similar to the second Tyrannofex when I get it.


A final group shot, they are truly huge compared to the Termagants, have enjoyed painting them a lot, in fact I am really enjoying the Tyranids, although I am chewing through paint like nobodies business. Almost makes me want to get a spray can.......

On a side note to the painting I have been slowly, but steadily acquiring the Tomb Kings models I need for the second army. Probably not going to be able to get the exact total I wanted originally, but beggars can't be choosers and I will modify the army list to suit what I end up getting. People so far have been pretty generous, but damn is eBay getting competitive for Tomb Kings stuff at the moment. If anyone comes across some Ushabti (especially with Great Bows) I am all ears.....

So that is my February, I will be aiming for another 20 Termagants and a stack of Tyranid Warriors next (just need to get a few bases). Not sure how many Termagants I should paint up. I have 80, but am wondering if 60 will be enough to cover the spawning rules......anyone have an idea?

Anyway, thanks for reading.

Looking very good, fast progress too!

Great work on these Tyranids. I'm loving the Godzillas! I'm feeling your pain on the TK front. Just a few models I really want to get hold of, but doing so is going to be a bitch.

Bugs are looking great. Nice work.

EDC

Fancy buganids, I like how that scheme has come together.

Nids look great. The carapace in particular has a nice look to it. It really stands out from the fleshy part and gives a good contrast to the model. Good stuff!

Hi all, finally managed to get some photos together and here is a long overdue update on what I have been getting up to on the hobby front.

First of all, here is the finished campaign map that my mate and I will be using for a narrative campaign.




I think it has come up very well and can't wait to start out campaign.

On the Tyranid front it has been nose to the grindstone yet again as I smash out a few more Termagants that I will be very happy to see the end of. But first here is the last of the big bugs.

First up is the second Tyrranofex, this one has an acid spray, so will be likely getting a lot closer to the enemy. Fingers crossed his partner in crime with the Rupture Cannon can keep him covered.


I don't feel the acid spray is as detailed as the rupture cannon and I am not totally happy with how it has come up.


Overall though it is identical to the previous Tyrannofex, which is an unfortunate side effect of the fact Tyranids lack gear and individual personality.


Except for one thing.......I carved the head back so all 4 of the big bugs have different heads to add a tiny bit of character to them.


Next up is the second Tervigon, with a giant gun?!? This is my conversion to represent the Miasma Cannon which I think fits my theme and having a ranged Tervigon could be a nasty trick.


I also extensively remodel the back legs to have it climbing up onto the ruin on the base. Could have spent a little more time on them. But I think it works.


Essentially the Misma Cannon is a seriously cut down Rupture cannon. But don't tell anyone.


And here we have the latest addition to the scuttling swarm. Another 20 Termagants taking their total to 60 so far. Only 20 more to go. I will be very happy when they are off my painting station.


And here is the whole happy, gribbly, scuttling family together in one shot. Not a bad output for March.

Next on the agenda will be more Termagants, Tyranid Warriors and 3 more Venomthropes. Which if I can manage it will be the end of the Tyranids of Hive Fleet Acidica.

Oh and I am also on the hunt for some Bretonnians as they are the next on GW's chopping block. So if you know of any going at a reasonable price you know how to find me.......

Thanks for reading.

Awesome stuff!

Thanks Paradigm, I am happy to be getting through them. Definitely starting to flag with my interest in the bugs. Hopefully switching over to the Tyranid Warriors will revive some interest.

You must continue, they look amazing, it is a different scheme that really pops bud, absolutely love it, so you must continue, i demand it!

I know how you feel actually - that's how I'm feeling about skeletons and gondor dudes right now. Still, your target sounds like one that will take only one more month of perseverance, (how many more termagants and warriors?) and your results are well worthwhile.

Maybe an army-so-far shot to bolster your enthusiasm? Set them up across the table from your IWs or Eldar and take a bunch of photos? It'd look fething sweet from our perspective, at least!

Several mock battle reports could be a good idea. I have a total of 20 termagants, 3 venomthropes and 19 warriors to round out this army. It is awesome to have giant alien gribblies as my troop choices.

You know your idea of the iron hands would be good as I am planning to revise them to the 32mm bases as I only have 33 models to do it to in that army......stay tuned.

Nids are looking great, I will add my voice to the chorus of 'you must continue!'

EDC

Hi all,

Been a little while since I managed an update and this one doesn't include any pretty pictures as I currently have nothing worth showing. However, I would like to ask for a vote on a painting project.

Seems my brother enjoyed his gift of the two primarchs so much he is speeding up the process by having two more of these beautiful models delivered to my door to paint. Add to that I had already decided to add a further 2 for his next birthday and I now have 4 primarchs sitting in pieces in my painting station.

So, what would people like to see first? Obviously I will still be plugging away at the remaining tyranids. But who would you like to see first? I now have:
Angron
Vulkan
Corax
Fulgrim

Let me know your vote and we will see who the popular choice is.

Thanks for reading.

Corax! Corax!

In case I wasn't clear, I think you ought to do Corax!

Vulkan! Salamanders are defo the coolest!

Corax for sure. I want to see what you can do with the sneakiest of primarchs.

Also good luck with the search for Bretonnians. I've been rushing to finish off my army, and ebay prices have been just awful since they announced the last chance to buy. It sucks that there are so many second-hand scalpers looking to make some easy money off panic buying.

Yeah panic buying sucks. Have had a little luck with the local Australian community. So after the Nids it will quite likely be a bretonnian army......

Hmmm getting a lot of requests (I post on another forum as well) seems split so far. But Corax is in the lead just over Fulgrim.

I'd probably go Corax as well actually.

I'm also looking for Brettonians, and even considering buying a battalion direct from GW. Mostly I'm after the newer archers and men at arms, as I've got one (?) set of the knights and some Pegasii already, and the Perrys can take care of more of the rest of those ones. A reliquae would probably have to be a scratchbuild.

I vote Angron. As he'll ge angry if you don't paint him first and he was the first to be released!

EDC

Guys you aren't helping ;-) was hoping there would be more of a consensus. But it seems they are all equally popular.

Ah first world problems hey?

You know, I was thinking Angron at first myself,. but changed to Corax since I've seen a fair few painted Angrons at this point, while I haven't seen Corax.

Yay more bugs. Also more primarchs. Woo!

Can't wait to see the whole buganid swarm arrayed for battle.

I'd like to vote for Corax as well.

Hey Archer. Looks like you'll have another shot at the Bretonnia army.

Just for those who don't know, 17 of the OOP kits are coming back in a limited run on the 18th. Including the bretonnian battalion box, men at arms, and knights of the realm.

Here's the link to GW: https://www.games-workshop.com/en-US/Warhammer?N=102351+4294965240&Nu=product.repositoryId&categoryId=cat440002a-flat&utm_campaign=ed7668ace2-CW_2016_4_11_Order_CS_ENG1&utm_source=GamesWorkshop.com&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c6e14e39d2-ed7668ace2-113914489&_requestid=16794186&qty=96&sorting=rec&view=table&categoryId=cat440002a-flat

Here's the link to the news thread: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/687070.page

Thanks for the link and heads up Freytag93. I have almost managed to get all the Bretonnians I had planned on (if this final eBay auction goes my way I am done).

But will definitely be keeping my eye on a couple of the other items being moulded again.

Well almost a month since my last update, so failing miserably at being more active on my own blog. But hopefully I am making a nuisance of myself over on all the other amazing blogs people are running.

First the real life news. I have a new job that I will be starting in a week's time. I have been looking for full-time employment for a year now (although I have been working non-stop the whole time) I wanted something that had the benefits of holiday and sick pay (if needed) and have finally managed to grab a position. Will be fun doing new things with new people. But I hope to keep up the modelling progress regardless.

Anyway, you will need to bear with me as this is going to be a fairly long post with a lot of pictures.......you have been warned. So, to start with here is what I have painted in April.



And a few closer shots (although my camera work is worse than normal so I apologize profusely).


These are the other group of Venomthropes, they are the older models (2 are metal and 1 is finecast) but I really like that these guys have tentacles extended while the others are sort of at rest.


The final lot of 20 termagants, so, so glad they are finally done. What a drag.....


Loved painting these guys, the Tyranid Warriors of the army, it may not be effective, but I think I have covered all of the weapon options they can take. SO hopefully I will be capable of covering any situation.


Although I was kind of sad that they are so homogeneous, it fits with the background obviously, but even the big bugs are nameless masses. Happy to have finished them and enjoyed the change from detail and individuality, but am definitely heading back to something with some real character next.

But as long time readers will know, when I have finished off an army it is time for, GROUP SHOT!


Sorry couldn't help myself, but I am really happy to be done with this army. Here are all the bugs together at long last. By my count it numbers 110 models, which takes my tally to 112 for the year (remmeber the 2 dragons at the beginning of the year?).


I am looking forward to using these guys, so many big horrible gribblies to frighten the hell out of my opponent.


The army looks huge, but remember for 2,000 point games the Termagants are purely for spawning (potentially the Tervigons can spit out 15 of the little guys and still be able to spawn so thats a potential of 30 a turn......)


This is a shockingly overexposed photo, but here are the HQ of the army, I love thinking that 2 enormous monsters lead the army. The one with the gun is wielding the Miasma Cannon (which is a special Venom Cannon) and the other (with the funky head) has the Norn Crown which increases the range of its Synapse ability so will be my Warlord.


The Elites of the army, hopefully these two broods can keep the rest of the horde in some level of cover, at least until the enemy take them out.


Here are my troops. All 19 of them. Doesn't sound like much, but they will take some killing. I hope that even though they are susceptible to instant death it will be unlikely they can handle all of them plus the big monsters quickly. So let them shoot at the warriors with the anti-tank weaponry and let the big bugs do their job.


The heavy hitters of the army. Hopefully this trio can deal with just about anything. I hope particularly the Toxicrene can spring a nasty surprise on any opponent running a monstrous creature and doesn't know what this particular beastie can do......


And the masses. These guys don't actually appear in the army list. They are the spawnable trash that I will hopefully be able to choke the enemy with. I hope.

On a completely unrelated note and in desperate need for a little individuality and I haven't done a Space Marine in absolutely ages. I thought I would challenge myself to do a single model to a slightly higher than my normal standard. Here is the result........my take on a Salamander Captain.


He turned out far better than I had hoped and therefore, I will need to include him in one of my armies. So, since he is meant to be a Salamander he is going to appear as Captain Dac’Tyr of the 4th, Lord of the Burning Skies.


I know its not really a salamander style cape. But I just couldn't figure out how to do scales......


Really happy how the salamander logo came out. I don't do a lot of freehand, but I think my brush control is getting way better. Have yet to figure out how I will base him or the army when I get around to it. But for now he will stand by as a cheerleader until such time I decide to do his accompany army.

Now onto some more painting progress. Primarchs.......

First up here is a few teaser shots of where I am up to with Fulgrim, yep he and Corax got the nod out of the 4, but first up we have Fulgrim, Lord of the Emperor's Children and a bit of a stuck up show pony.

I have a lot more to do, but I am making progress.










So I think he was the first Primarch (or close to it) to be done by Forgeworld and it shows a little. The other Primarchs that came later that I have seen are a lot smarter in their assembly and it seems they are learning as they go. Otherwise he is a fine sculpt and I am enjoying the challenge although I am still not happy with the purple on Fulgrim, but am happy enough to move forward. I intentionally dirtied up the dead marines around him as I want him as a shining pinnacle of perfect poncing. So he will be shiny and light on his feet where the bodies are dirty and muddy (also helps elevate him as the central figure).

I am really happy with the free hand on the shoulder pads of the marines, especially the Iron Hands logo. Wish I had this sort of control when I did that army all those moons ago now. I figure the base is now done and it is time to finish off Fulgrim himself. Shouldn't take too long. Was hoping to get him done for the first week of May to ship off to my Brother for his birthday, but I doubt that will be happening.

And onto the second photo drop, Corax, a fragile and fiddly model to assemble, but damn he looks spectacular.








Really, really like this model and shows how far Forge World have come in the 30k character range compared to oor Fulgrim up there. I have finished the base (apart from the poor victim, aiming for I think a Luna Wolf/Son of Horus) but have done almost nothing on Corax. Although I hope he will have a very fine bluish tinge to his armour that will be almost impossible to see except in person when done. The build was a pain in the butt though with a couple of the "feathers" having broken off in transit. But that has been fixed (not too hard in the end) but I dread packaging him to send to Brisbane (1000 km from where I live.

So I will leave this update here as I have filled it with far more than I thought I had. Hope you stuck with my ramblings and find something cool to look at. When I next post I will let you all know where my Crazy Army plan will take me next. Sorry no choice on the next one as my Wife has stepped in and given me my orders......

Thanks for reading.

Impressive Nid army, especially given how (relatively speaking) recently you started the force! Love the purple you've got on Fulgrim too!

Great work on the nids Archer. I know (trust me, I know) how hard it is to grind through a nid army. Doing all of the repetitive little guys will drive you insane. But when you see the army all together like that, it's worth it.

8 down and who knows how many more to go, mate. Keep up the good work!

The 'nids look amazing, especially as a horde. An amazingly impressive output in such a short time.

The nids look great together, looking forward to seeing what you do with the Primarchs.

EDC

Thanks guys for the comments. Was quite a large post in the end so I appreciate you sticking with me to the end.

With the Tyranids out of the way I will be switching over to a fantasy army and as I have said it will be a Bretonnian army. I plan on doing 2 (even have the models for two!?!) just need to decide which one will be done.

The options are either a peasant heavy army with very few Knights. The other is a crusade style army with lots of questing knights, plus some knight errant. Thoughts?

Your vote Az is noted for the Crusader one.....

I would say the Crusaders, purely because it would be different to the fairly hordey Tyranids you just finished. A Crusade force of Knights all with heraldry, be it all different or in unified schemes, would be awesome as well, and I look forward to seeing both ideas done.

The Nid army does look amazing. a lot of hard work went into those guys and it really shows.

Hi all,

I have been hit hard starting my new job. So much to learn and get my head around. But thoroughly enjoying it still 3 days in. I have to admit to being completely unaware about how wound up and stressed my previous job had me, so being able to sleep easier and probably a much nicer person to be around (read that as a public apology to my wife....). So I haven't managed any real painting progress worth showing off. Although I am happy to say I have finished the bases for the two current Primarchs now. Quite happy with the Son of Horus on Corax's base. Although I still need to free hand the symbols on his shoulder pads.....not looking forward to that.

But I figured it was time to post up the next army and following on from the helpful hints I have decided to go with the "Crusade" style Bretonnian army and the Peasant force can await a later time. So without further adieu here is the next one.

2,000 Point Warhammer Fantasy Bretonnian Army - The “Vain” Quest for the Grail, the 11th Crusade of Araby

Questing Lord Jacques the Vain - Questing Vow, Virtue of the Impetuous Knight, Insignia of the Quest, Sword of the Quest, Cuirass of Fortune, Barded Bretonnian Warhorse

Paladin Fillippe the Tutor - Battle Standard Bearer with Conqueror’s Tapestry, Questing Vow, Virtue of Noble Disdain, Barded Bretonnian Warhorse
Paladin Henri Hero of Montforte - Questing Vow, Virtue of Heroism, Great Weapon, Holy Icon, Barded Bretonnian Warhorse
Damsel Louisa the Unwilling Guide - Level 2, The Silver Mirror, Barded Bretonnian Warhorse

The Spurless Knights - Cavalier Edmund, Musician, Standard Bearer with Errantry Banner, 9 Knight Errant
Upholders of Tradition - Gallant Pietr, Musician, Standard Bearer with Gleaming Pennant, 5 Knights of the Realm

The Grail Seekers - Paragon Julian, Musician, Standard Bearer with Scarecrow Banner, 5 Questing Knights
Grail Addicts - Paragon Frederike, Musician, Standard Bearer with Banner of Eternal Flame, 5 Questing Knights
The Final Quest - Paragon Wilfred, Musician, Standard Bearer, 5 Questing Knights

The theme I am running with here is that not every quest for the Grail is an honorable or sensible one. In this case my Lord Jacques is a self absorbed Knight who is starting to get on in years and even though he has never been blessed by visions of the Grail has taken it upon himself to go and find the damn thing. He has dragged along his courts Damsel who has cautioned him against such a rash action, but not to be dissuaded he has gathered a small collection of fellow questing knights of various motivations and is riding around the countryside making a Monty Python nuisance of himself.

So I have assembled the Knight Errant (lovely metal models, great sculpts the lot of them) and hope to get them done this month and probably will try to get either the knights of the Realm started or the Damsel done as well. As far as colour schemes go I was thinking of painting the Knight Errant with heraldic style colours and patterns, but no actual heraldry (as they haven't earned it yet), the Knights of the realm with colours and symbols and the Questing Knights I was thinking of doing probably white or a very light brown/mustard but with heraldry symbols as I figure they have given up their colours in the search for the grail. Any thoughts on that plan?

Thanks for reading and look forward to hearing your thoughts.

I would like to take the chance to wish Azazelx and his family all the best in this time of hardship as well. I know Az wants to keep the blogs free of condolences and full of hobby, but I feel it appropriate to post my thoughts and best wishes here. So hope you are around mate to read them and will look for your return when things are looking a little brighter.

Looking forward to the next army Archer, I do feel a Knight Errant my be a bit of an over kill in Fantasy though

Really looking forward to this army. I'm not so sure about the list. I think it might be a bit better if you had more KE or KotR instead of the 3rd QK unit to better absorb enemy fire. But overall, it'll be a fun list to play with, and I am sure that it will look fantastic

Yeah a knight errant may be a little overkill. That's why I am taking 12...... Just in case.

The three units of questing knights may be a little silly. But since I am going to do a second army at some point in the future I will end up with more knights if I need to. Besides, surely you know by now my army building skills are pretty poor. Ah well. I love the rag tag look of the questing knight models. Real sense of desperation to them so looking forward to getting stuck into them.

Very nice start on Fulgrim, the Nids are looking ace as well . Interested in seeing your Knight Errants too.

Ok guys, I am getting a little ahead of myself with this. But I am likely to be doing an Alpha Legion army (for 40k that is) as the one after this Bretonnian one. What I am wondering is how I should actually do the army. Should I go traditional chaos marines, loyalist marines painted as alpha legion or some combination of the two? The army list if it helps is a mirror image of itself (as in two identical lords, 2 chosen units armed the same way, 2 havoc units the same etc. etc. etc.)

Any thoughts would be appreciated whilst I get stuck into painting some Bretonnian Knights.

I reckon the best place to start would be the Betrayal at Calth plastics, MkIV armour is awesome in AL colours and you don't really want to be using MkVII or later, which the majority of the current Loyalist kits are. I'd mix the MkIV from BaC and a few of the least gribbly/spiky CSM bits, you don't really want any demonic corruption to any great extent.

Looking forward to seeing this Bret army!

Thanks Archer.
How you build them is going to depend on your personal interpretation of how Chaosy/corrupted your version (or your splinter) of the Alphas Legion is going to be.

If they're corrupted, then go hard with the chaosy parts, but if they're more like double-triple-quadruple agents who are loyal to the Emperor (if not the Imperium) or not in thrall to the Chaos powers then I'd go with a mix of Calth and "modern" 40k marine parts, minimising the Chaos components.

If you're going that way, perhaps even have a squad or two of "Ultramarines" in the army that have a bit of a green or metallic green wash over their standard blue, and the "Ultra" logo "inverted" (ha ha) to be an Omega. You know - at first glance they're Ultramarines, but then you double-take and realise that they're a bit off.

Hi Az, really like the idea of the inverted Ultramarine.....fits the little bits of fluff I have written for the planned Ultramarine army as well as the Alpha Legionnaires. Works so well I may need to look into it. But maybe one or two squad members rather than a whole squad. Individual infiltrators rather than a whole squad and all that. Food for thought.

Definitely will be working on the not in touch with Chaos at all with my Alpha Legion, so Para's idea of Battle for Calth models mixed in suits them as well.


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Hi all, so a little bit of painting update. Have been recovering slowly from the shock of a new job and hope to settle in further quickly. But the paint has continued to flow (albeit slowly). My darling Wife insisted I run out and get some much needed paint supplies and am ready to get some serious work done on the Bretonnian Knight Errant. But the biggest news of my painting table is the completion of this guy.......

















I am really happy with how he came out. I was a little suss halfway through as I felt he was pretty monochrome and I felt that led him to looking a little messy. Enter my Wife and her crazy ideas and I ended up going off reservation and added a little colour to him and I like how it turned out. There is in fact a little blue to his armour which I felt led to the wings demonstrating a much more blue hue than I originally intended. But hey I think he works.

The Son of Horus probably could have been darker green, but I liked the brighter look since Corax is so dark.

Plan to have Fulgrim done by the end of this coming week (as my attention is going to shift to the Knight Errants). So hope to be able to ship them off to my Brother really soon (only a couple of weeks late for his birthday.....)

Thanks for looking and welcome your thoughts.

That is a very spectacular job you have done, looks amazing Archer, really like the finish, has a great feel to it. That hint of colour is just right, I am no aficionado so don't really know who he is, but I think he looks brilliant. His wings are spectacular.

I am afraid I do have just one small critique, the chainsword is too clean, the rest of the piece looks brilliant, and you have done a nice clean job on the chain sword, but that's it, it is clean compared to the rest. It is only a small thing that stood out a little to me. Could put the wrappings on the floor like he just unwrapped it from the shop maybe! Or maybe it was a gift from Mum, so he polishes it a bit more than anything else! Sorry don't wish to have a go about it, it just stood out a bit to me, and thought it worth pointing out as the model over all is just so excellent.

No need to apologize I welcome the comments. Do you think a wash or two would do the trick? Maybe a brown one around the teeth to give an effect of oil/grease built up and maybe something to tone the yellow stripes down a tad?

Holy smeg, that's superb! Dare I say it, your best model yet!

Do you have anything like the Vallejo Smoke Ink wash? That'd give an oily, muddy look to the chainsword. Alternatively, just slap some gore all over it, that'll contrast nicely with the stripes and liven it up a bit.

Unfortunately I only have GW paints (never managed to launch into other ranges). So was thinking a couple of very thin black and brown/flesh washes to tone it down. Kind of want to avoid gore on this one.

In that case Agrax Earthshade or Typhus /Corrosion (or a mix of the two) will do just as good a job!

Wow thats amazing, I really like what you've done with the wings.

That's great work on Raven/surfer dude .
I really like how you did the pinions on the wings and the blue of the gun.

I prefer Alpha legion with no corruption as they are the purest of all the Emperors loyal legions. But they have dealt with aliens and are not above using xeno tech, so maybe add on a tau gun or eldar sword as trophies.

That diorama base is excellent!

Looking forward to your Brettonians.

*guy deploying a folding chair meme here*

Without drawing too much of my attention away from the Brets, I am liking the idea of using the Betrayal at Calth models as Chosen (since they are supposed to be ancient veterans) and then use paired down chaos marines (no super chaos bits horns, mutations etc. , but still want them to be obviously chaos) as my regular chaos marines and havocs.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Thanks to everyone that has commented. I really appreciate the effort in stopping by and leaving a comment. If I haven't noticed advice from anyone I apologise.

Corax looks superb. I think the subtle colour added to his wings still fits very well and it takes the model away from being too monochromatic, without making it look too colourful either.

 Archer wrote:

That Corax Wow mate, he looks absolutely superb. I love the blue on the wings. I would have never thought to do that, but it works so well. I honestly think this may be your best model yet.
Well done!

Thanks for all the comments guys. I really appreciate the feedback.

Have applied a very thin black to the chainsword body and a slightly heavier one around the teeth. Looks more muted now.

Making slow progress on the Brets. They are a step back in line with my normal painting. But getting the really bright, vibrant colours I want is a painful process.

So its the end of May and I have managed to scrape an update in. I have not been managing much hobby wise, adjusting to the new job and starting the long road to looking for a new home. But those are real life problems and I prefer to look at what I have achieve. So I present to you the start of my next army the Bretonnians.


Here are the 12 Knight Errant. I went with the plan to have them with all different heraldic colors and designs, but no actual heraldry. I figure they haven't won their spurs yet, so they also don't have any symbols either. I think they are quite Bretonnian in their appearance and I used a couple of colours throughout to try and unify them as a unit. But I am not overly concerned with that with this army.


It is pretty much of a holdover from 8th edition now, but I have made sure that they can rank up into the lance formation that the Bretonnians were once famous for.


I am very happy with how they have come together, they look very different from my Empire army (which is also all Knights) which can only be a good thing. Although they are a little more painting intensive since they are all different to each other.


And the last shot is them on a movement tray. This one is made out of MDF rather than the plastic GW ones (mainly due to them being hard to find now and if you do people want a premium for them). So I took it as a chance to experiment with a different way of doing a tray.

So I am pleased with the first models for the Bretonnians which hopefully will inspire me to move faster in the painting, but I have some conversions ahead of me, I have 18 of the Questing Knight metal models (thanks to a user on WargamerAU (you know who you are) that was kind enough to sort me out with them and to boot he has already done some great head swaps. But I want a total of 24 so will be working out some conversions to represent the last six, that I hope once scattered among the others will be hard to detect.

I also still have the Primarchs to contend with. Fulgrim is just around the corner (promise) so I may try to knock him out first, although I am a lot less pleased with him than Corax. Then I have another two to go in this latest batch.

Thanks for reading.

Great work on these guys, Archer. They really look the business, and the individual colours looks just as Bretonnians should. Let me know if you spot a (spare) Battalion box anywhere. I wanted to buy one, but the start of May led to not grabbing one when GW had a few left..

They look perfect bud. Always loved these guys. Can't believe they are gone. Every little boys dream is a fort and proper knights on horseback. Used to have an army. Fond memories. Thanks.

@AzI believe that GW may be doing another run of some of the last chance to buy stuff. May be worth keeping an eye on the GW website just in case.

@Cam I have always looked at the number of models/armies that I have had and moved to another home and wondered what might have been if I had kept them. But then I would have absolutely no space left......


Automatically Appended Next Post:
So I have prepared the Knights of the Realm for painting (ie. Horses are assembled, Knights are on sticks sans shields) and I have also put together a Damsel on horse who is likely to run with this unit (at least until I discover it is a terrible idea) as she can be protected inside the lance formation pretty well. But have yet to get any paint on them as yet. I was going to go around to a mates place for a little hobby time, but that has since fallen through so may get some progress done tonight.

However, the main reason for this update is the fact I have finished the next Primarch in the queue. Fulgrim the Phoenician is all done and dusted and just need to box him up and send him north to my Brother.

Here he is.......


I am pretty happy with the purple, although with so much gold it kind of loses the impact.


I cheated a little a put a thinned down gloss onto the cloak to make it stand out as it looked a little dusty.


I tried to differentiate the hair from the white tassel's by bringing it up from a blue base coat rather than brown to give some point of difference between the two.


I tried to give the sword a bit of a bone/otherworld look as it is supposed I believe to house a Greater Daemon of Slaanesh that I am not sure whether it manages to possess him or not, but definitely leads him to Horus's side in the Heresy.


I really like the base for Fulgrim, I intentionally left them dirty and dusty so Fulgrim shines as if dirt and grime is afraid to touch him.


Particularly happy with the freehand Iron Hands symbol. If only I had a steady hand when I did that army all thise moons ago......


I think I have managed to capture the self absorbed crazy that Fulgrim was, although it is obvious he was one of the first Primarch's sculpted as compared to the others I have it is a weaker sculpt. They have learned a lot about sculpting these guys as they go along.


So there you go, the 4th Primarch I have done. Not as good as Corax in my opinion and thus far my least favorite to paint.

Thanks for reading.

Cracking stuff, being purely critical I would agree with you about the comparison with Corax, but that's more to do with the Raven being just awesome. Fullers definitely holds up and looks great, excellent use of colour and tone!