Erik Axegrinder: Rogues Gallery Spotlight

Following on from the the previous Deathwatch post, I felt the desire to work further on these guys. In particular I wanted to get their bases extended.

Erik Axegrinder, rebased.

Especially EriK Axegrinder, whose cloak was originally modeled to appear to drape below the edge of his base. Luckily I was able to model the Secret Weapon Conversion Rings in a way that made it still work.

Cloak paws still hanging free.

I also added a Tzeentch bird skull to the base. It is from the Citadel Skull box set (that you seriously need to get). In the Deathwatch RPG game that I played him in, the Kill Team he was a member of took on the Thousand Sons who, as you probably know, are minions of Tzeentch. Also the Space Wolves have a history of Tzeentch hate so the choice of that skull seemed to make sense.

Another side of Erik.

I have extended the bases of the other Deathwatch guys as well, but their progress hasn't proceeded much beyond this point so I will put off discussing them further until I can give them a proper post.

Progress is slow, but progress continues.

But in the meanwhile, Erik Axegrinder is once again done, and he offically gets his place in the Neverness Rogues Gallery.

Feeling Khorney (Part 7)

Upon returning home from our vacation to Florida and inspired by my recent purchase of the 40k 8th edition Chaos Codex while down there, I set about getting this unit of Khorne Berserkers finished.

Blood and skullz. For our big bases.

Regular readers may recall that I started on these guys way back in 2013. And although they were mostly done within that year, I was set back by trying to find a certain set of decals and with deciding whether or not to expand their bases. Well, I did decide to expand their bases, but the base extenders I use can feel like work when you have to do so many at once.

The mob of Berserkers with completed extenders.

This particular group of models have slightly smaller bases than the typical bases that come in a regular box set. These models were produced during 40k's 2nd Edition, and for a time GW was more interested in creating very simple "plug and play" models in plastic, even incorporating the base on the model's sprue. I attribute this to the slightly smaller size which makes the extenders, just barely, not want to make contact all the way around. I overcame this by glueing the ring together around the model first (see next pic below), then applying superglue to the orginal base all the way around, then adjusting the mini until it made contact to the extender where I preferred it to be.

Hulu hooping for Khorne! 

That worked out well, although there are some minis that required a bit of Greenstuff to fill in the joins.

Due to time constraints I am having to do these a few minis at a time. Here are the first 5 models, with the extender and additional gravel painted in Territorial Beige.

Terracotta Brown.

To match the existing color I washed Brown Ink over the Territorial Beige.

Brown Ink Wash.

To complete this, I matched the color by drybrushing Territorial Beige over the new section before drybrushing over the whole base with Desert Sand.

Desert Sand highlights.

And with that the bases are now extended, they just need to be flocked. All I need to do now is finish the rest of them (ten more after this) and apply decals. And some models require a bit of glue too.
I'm getting there...

Supply Drop Tussle.

Hello, and welcome to our first Battle Report in quite some time.

The Bob and I have been trying to arrange a game all summer and finally the stars aligned to make it happen. We are both easing into Warhammer 40K 8th Ed but not at a place where either of us feel like giving it a go yet. So, we chose Kill Team. This pleased me as it finally gave me the opportunity to play with my Celestial Lions Kill Team that I had spent so much time on.

We rolled up the mission, but disliked what we rolled and we instead decided to try out Supply Drop. Our wonderful game store, HobbyTown in Johnson City , recently expanded out their play area and we now have 4 tables permanently (-ish) set up there and awaiting use. We decided to give the lava board a try. We set it up to look a bit like a recently abandoned military installation.

How much do lava vents bring down property by?

Bob brought out his Dark Angels:

Another secret meeting.

...and I introduce the Celestial Lions to their first game.

"Don't eat the yellow snow guys..."

Leader Traits were generated, with the Dark Angels getting Unshakeable Dedication to Duty, which just turns him into a more zealous zealot than he already was. And the Celestial Lions got A Cunning Ruse which allowed me to split and place half my Kill Team into Reserves for some tricky infiltration tactics.

Celestial Lions Deployment.

My Specialists were the Missile Launcher with Sharpshooter (which ignores cover), Grav Gun guy with Relentless, and Scope Bolter guy with Move Through Cover.

Dark Angels deployment.

Turn 1, and we start out the game with the cover of darkness for a round. The cover bonus truly helped as it allowed one of my guys to save from an attack from the Dark Angels. My shooting was...scary-bad. I hit with most shots but wounded with nearly none. The one model that was wounded made his save. Both sides advanced towards the objective markers looking for the real objective; and it was the DA Kill Team leader who found it. It was way over on my left flank close to the DA deployment zone.

"This is the brew we are looking for!"

A Ravenwing biker would declare a charge on my Kill Team leader only to be vaporized by his plasma pistol on the Overwatch shot! First Blood goes to the Celestial Lions!

Turn 2, all but one of my outflankers arrive. This would turn out to be an exciting round of the game.

"Hey, THAT is our brew!"

A number of targets would get cut down in this round including the Dark Angel leader who was ambushed by the outflankers. One of the Ravenwing would also get picked off as well by the missile laucher whose Ignore Cover ability would deny the Ravenwing biker's ability to Jink.

"Target clear!"

Turn 3, The Dark Angels, although taken back by the Lion's effective round 2, rebounded quickly after seeing them totally fail on Turn 3. They turned their focus on to the objective killing the two Lions who had killed their leader on Turn 2.

"Vengeance!"

Back on Turn 2 my Grav Gun guy with Relentless arrived via his Ouflanking maneuver, and he and the Dark Angel on top of the bunker traded shots but either failed to hit, failed to wound or the other guy saved. Another Lion, on the otherside of the bunker, also targeted that DA and failed to eliminate him also. On Turn 3 the last reserved CL, "Beakie", came on and joined Grav Gun Guy. And so it was that it was three Celestial Lions vs. a single Dark Angel and no one was able to take anyone else out! When Turn 4 came up, I gave up and moved the Lions towards the objective as dealing with this seemingly unkillable grunt was proving to be fruitless!

"No one will take this bunker from me!"

Turn 4, and the bunker guy would continue to trade shots with the three Celestial Lions as they moved away from him, and still no one died.

On the other side of the battlefield the Dark Angels would manage to kill the Lion on top of the big bunker, while the last Ravenwing would move in for an attack run on my leader.

Ravenwing spots his next target...

The Dark Angels would retake the objective, while the Ravenwing biker shoots his bolters at the Celestial Lion's leader. Surviving that attack, the biker then declared a charge.

"Chaaaarge...!"

However for the second time in this game, my leader would successfully hit with his Overwatch attack, vaporizing another charging Ravenwing biker!

Lion Sgt vapes the biker!

Turn 5, and I guess killing 2/3s of the Ravenwing with Overwatch shot make the Sgt cocky, so he declared a charge against the missile launcher, narrowing avoiding the snap fired Krak missile that flew past his head! However neither foe would eliminate the other and they would be locked in combat.

Locked in combat!

Also in that turn Dark Angel holding the objective would be killed by one of the advancing Lions.

Now Broken, the Dark Angels had to make break tests. The lone Dark Angel holding the bunker must have been upset that the Celestial Lions passed him by because he just up and left!

Meanwhile the other Dark Angel dove into the frey to assist the Missile Launcher guy.

Two on one!

If only they were 3's...

The above pic shows the roll made for the 3 Save attempts my Sergent was forced to make. As you can see, he was eliminated. And he failed to take any of the other guys with him!

Starr of Turn 6.

With fresh blood on their treacherous hands, the two Dark Angels, having defeated my leader, consolidated closer to the objective.

Bottom of Turn 6.

It's the bottom of Turn 6, and Bob is thinking it's game over and that there is no way he can recover. I pushed him to roll for game length anyway and suggested to him that if he threw both his surviving Dark Angels at the Lion on the objective that he could pull off a win. Not expecting the dice to co-operate he rolls and sure enough the dice gods decree that the game goes on! And, continuing the trend, those damn Angels live through everything the Lions throw at them. They then boldly approach the objective, staying just an 1" away from the Celestial Lion who is claiming it. Bob was about to forgo his shooting phase so that both his guys could charge when I, nice guy that I am, point out that his guys probably have Bolt Pistols they could switch too. "Oh yeah..." he says, as he casually shoots the Lion in the head.

"It's not an execution, more like a merciful release."

And with that fatal shot, the Dark Angels claim the Objective and Break my Kill Team!

Our VPs tallied out as follows;

Celestial Lions: First Blood, Slay the Leader, Linebreaker and Break Enemy for a total of 4 VPs.

Dark Angels: Slay the Leader, Break Enemy and The Objective for a total of 5 VPs.

End of Turn 7.

My MVP was probably my leader, the Sergeant, for his amazing Overwatch kills on those Ravenwing bikers.

I think Bob's MVP was his Missile Launcher guy. That guy absorbed a lot of firepower! Most of my (albeit stray or dud) missle shots were directed at him, and other marines also shot at him. Then of course my Sgt failed to kill him in two close combat phases. He was definitely a survivor in this fun any-way-it-could-go, game. Thanks again Bob!

Leave it to Reivers (Part 3)

With a few hours to spare on a day off I managed to complete The Reivers.

Reivers on patrol.

They were mostly done by the end of Part 2, but decal application is always something that takes me more time than it probably should. But today, I was determined to get the decals done.  So they were and so was the final painted details and the flocking of the base.

Decals done!

 Here are some individual shots:

And here they are joined by the regular marine that I painted prior to these guys in order to test out my Ultramarines paint scheme. He looks so tiny next to these guys...

Grass added and touch-ups done.

And, like I have been doing lately when I complete a project, I like to take the models outside to get some natural lighting shots and to photo them in an environment that isn't my painting station.

Still patroling...

"Look Sarge, up there!"

So there they are, my first fully painted Primaris Marines and my most recent additions to my Ultramarines. I do plan on doing more with this army but there are a few other projects I want to complete before the new year.

Death Castle (Part 7)

This post continues the re-presentation of the original Death Castle thread I originally posted on http://warhammer-empire.com way back in 2008. See Part 1 for why I am reposting it here.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

PART 7
Originally posted July 26 2008.

Death Castle is slowly starting to come along. I've spent a few evenings filling holes, plugging gapes, filling in cracks and smoothing over seams. Not all of them though, I am wanting the final product to maintain a 'rough' look. 

Here's my assistant checking on the quality of my work:

"This piece requires extra scrutiny."

Once that was done, I went ahead and finally spray painted the main body of the castle black. Finally, after 20 years, this Castle has been successfully painted black!

Death Castle- primed! 

I'm sure I mentioned this earlier in the thread, but the paint I used was a floral designers spray paint called Design Masters. You can find it in the U.S. at most Arts & Craft stores or any where that sells fake decorative flowers. Here's what the can looks like, next to a piece of Styrofoam that had been sprayed with it. This is a Flat Black (gloss will not be good for the additional paint I will be applying).

Design Masters,  the safe way to paint Styrofoam.

This other pic shows what a blast of normal black spray paint does to Styrofoam (in case the earlier pics of Death Castle didn't reveal enough already). The spray paint used in this example was Krylon. It causes a chemical reaction that burns and bubbles away at the foam leaving very little color and obvious damage. It can be used intentionally however to create battle damage, and looks really good on some of my 40k scenery. 

Styrofoam damaged by regular spray paint.

Coming up next, I need to tackle the tower...

Slaughterpriest (Part 1)

Slaughterpriest needs skulls! 

While working on another project (you'll see soon) I somehow found myself distracted by the notion to model up this Slaughterpriest miniature. This is the model that came free with White Dwarf when it went back to a monthly schedule last year.

"Free" with White Dwarf.  

Assembling him was a fairly easy, but that chain arm is a bit of a trial. Of course, it will probably be a cold day in hell before I ever play Age of Sigmar so he had to be adapted to 40k. He will be a Khorne themed Chaos Cultist Champion. So I hacked off that gnarly blade he had and swapped it with an Autopistol. He looks like he's flexing with it, which amuses me for some reason. And that autopistol looks proportionally correct on a model for the first time ever. Also, he is REALLY tall! I was told the Khorne dudes for AoS were stupid big, and this guy is no exception. They actually are taller than the new Primaris Marines!

"Cadia died so I could be this big, what happened to you?"

I stuck some grenades on him as well.

Grenades ...and skulls!

The skulls on his base are from the new Skulls Basing kit (which I highly recommend! I can't wait to stick some Tau and Kroot skulls onto my Ultramarines bases!) and I felt they added a cool amount of Grimdark to the model. I used a 32mm base instead of the 40mm base he came with as I thought that I didn't really need that bigger base. Also, he is a cultist leader, not an Aspiring Champion or some other major character so I didn't feel that he deserved the extra prominence on the table.

Ready to be primed.

Since this was modeled today -completely off schedule- I have no idea when I will paint him. But I look foward to it regardless.

Neverness goes to TBS Comics!

Traffic in Florida.

We went to Florida, to the beach, only to find that Hurricane Harvey decided to have it's way with the gulf region at the same time that we had scheduled this trip.

Two Red Flags = Stay out of the water! 

So we explored the town's shopping options (we're Americans, it's what we do) and we found TBS Comics at Fort Walton Beach. It's a big store, however I easily spotted the gaming area upon walking in. Although there wasn't anyone playing at the time, I was still very impressed with the tables they have there. Each of the tables has a frame with it's own overhead light set up to illuminate the board. The scenery was nice as well. I didn't think to take any pics though. They do have a video showing these tables posted on their Facebook page.

Mrs. Neverness found the Wonder Woman comic she had been trying to find for over a year, and I found the GW area and grabbed up the new Chaos Codex and cards. Right next to that area was a large glass case full of painted miniatures. Mostly Orks. And mostly scratch built vehicles or heavily converted ones. I had to take pics of these!

How many Primaris Marines = a Master Chief?

The centerpiece, the thing that commands you to stop and gawk, is the massive walker based off the Covenant one from the Halo video game series. It is huge and awesome! It has lots of details including a marine on top of it challenging some orks.

They'll loot anything!

Next is a looted Valkyrie. I thought this was pretty darn cool. I've had Valkyrie-envy since the model was released but never got one as I have yet to ever get around to working on my Imperial Guard. But to convert it over to a looted ork vehicle just never would have crossed my mind.

Big ork vehicle parade!

All sorts of scavenged and looted parts were used on everything in this collection. This dred is no exception as well as that massive tank behind it.

Vehicle mounted Tractor Cannon?

Towards the rear of the dispay was a group of looted vehicles that appeared to have converted Tractor Cannons or Lifta Droppas on them. They were really fun models to look out. Notice in the pic below the rear side of a scratch built Squiggoth!

Meks At Work.

Buggies! The next pair of pics detail the amazing scratch built buggies that were on display as well.

Of course the red onez are in front...

...the blues take the rear. And checkout that death roller!

It wasn't all orks on display, checkout these weird chaos constructs:

Sprue Spawns.

I mean, with the premium prices of the physical plastic sprue frames, this kind of makes sense...

...and while speaking of chaos, has a more subversive, dark and sinister warband ever been assembled?

Everything's A-OK.

Those were so much fun. I don't know who modeled those but I am glad they were on display, so thanks to TBS for hosting them. Also thanks to the helpful staff that assisted us and especially for helping Mrs. Neverness out with her Wonder Woman questions.

I made some purchases, something to read while waiting on the sun to return. The new Chaos Codex, the accompanying card set, and the free Battle Primer. The Chaos Codex is a nice book so far, but as usual I probably won't have a true opinion about it until I play a few games with it. Weird that GW had no other chaos paintings to use for a cover considering that this was the cover of the 6th Ed Codex (late 2012?).

My purchases and plug for TBS Comics.

 So if you find yourself at Fort Walton Beach on the Florida Panhandle stop by their store and support them. And don't forget to check out that display case, my pics do not do them justice!

Meanwhile, on the beach:

Hivefleet scouts detected!