Celestial Lions Retro Tactical Squad (Part 2)

 Continuing on from Part 1 , I have reached the middle steps of this batch painting project. First off I picked out all the belts, tubes, joints, metal areas, grills, etc. with Abaddon Black. All the recesses and joins were washed over with a 50/50 mix of classic Citadel Chestnut Ink and water. 

Base coats.

Next came the application of Space Marine Blue. This is a classic Citadel color from the ancient Space Marine Paint Set from 1989, and one of the oldest paints in my collection. It's still so perfect for my needs and I hope to find a replacement for it some day.

Middle stages. 

I had to slow down (okay, stop) this project while I worked on my Dreadtober project for this year. If you saw those posts you might have seen these guys standing vigil in the background of some of those pics.  Puny golden sentinels poised for action while big daddy dread slowly came to life. ..

Standing vigil.

With my work schedule  being  very punishing this holiday season this is about as far as I think I'm going to get with these guys before the year is up.  But never say never especially when there are so many week left to grind through...

Celestial Lions Retro Tactical Squad (Part 1)

 It's been bugging me for a good while now that my Celestial Lions are sitting in limbo. They were made for the first edition of Kill Team (the one that used 7th edition rules) but haven't been playable since.  When Da Masta Cheef returned for his monthly work visit, he proposed a 750 point game. With such a small points level in mind I  contemplated playing one of my smaller factions and the Celestial Lions stuck out as a potential candidate for such a game. Sadly I couldn't join that game anyway, but he'll be back one day, and I plan to have these guys waiting for him. 

I know some Necron players who would consider this paint job 'done. 

These miniatures are from the 2nd edition era of Warhammer 40,000. Specifically these are the Space Marines from that edition's main box. Although only the Sergeant and flamer are from that. The others, all cast in blue plastic, were from a Waldenbooks exclusive set. I uncovered a bag full of these guys, that Warfrog gave me ages ago, when I was looking for a single one of these guys to paint for their anniversary event last summer. These miniatures are definitely iconic and were the default space marine miniature for most of the 1990s. 

The full squad.

After cleaning up the flash and mold lines I  applied grit to their bases. A few guys got a skull on their bases too, because it's just the Grim Dark thing to do. 

Gritted and ready for paint. 

The loose shoulder pad is for a character I'm doing for these guys,  but I'll talk about that in a future post.  So  I cracked open my old Krylon 18k Gold paint and blasted away. 

Solid fool's gold. 

And with that, these models are now primed and basecoated. Well the armor anyway. The rest of their details will be picked out soon. 

Awaitng the next steps...

Rest & Recovery Models

 A week ago I was released from the hospital  (yay!) But with a lame primary arm. (Boo). You can see more details on all of that in the previous post.. I couldn't paint or draw,  but I could, carefully, build models. As you might be aware, my pile of unbuilt kits is somewhat overwhelming and it's nice to find time to build some of  them even though the circumstances suck. It was relaxing actually and helped take my mind off things. 

Primaris invasion! 

So what did I build? Well, mostly all of the marines from my Imperium Magazine collection. Starting with a squad of Eliminators. Although technically I haven't finished building them yet as their gums and backpacks cover up a lot of details I need to be able to reach with my paint brush. So I will finish their build-outs as I paint them. 

Snipers! 

Next came the Primaris Lieutenant in Phobos Armour. I think he'll be a perfect leader for my Reivers. Even though he's not  nearly as terrorifying despite his big-ass knife. 

Lt. with scary mask envy.

The next unit that was assembled was  a rather large unit of Infiltrators. I think these models are rather bad-ass and I am very impressed with their poses and details. 

Does he  have a wrist mounted ...TV? 

"Yeah, anyway where was I?"

Pew pew.

I followed that up with the assembly of a Primaris Librarian with the cameoline cloak. I'm thinking that this guy might be fun to stick with the Eliminators since clearly they shop at the same military surplus outlet. 

Librarian Excedrin.  

Next came a squad of Assault Intercessors. I was careful to make sure not to use the same head on the Sergeant to distinguish him from the first squad of these guys that I have already built. 

Assault Intercessors Squad 2.

While building these guys I happened to review their army list to see that the Sergeant can have a different load out which inspired me to assemble the next squad of Assault Intercessors with a very kit-bashed Sergeant.  His head comes from the Ultramarines  Upgrade Sprue, the thunderhammer is from the old Vanguard kit, and his hand flamer is the classic one from the early '90s Space Marine accessory sprue.  I think I dig him! 

"I will set them on fire then beat 'em with my hammer!"

The final guy to be assembled (mostly) during this construction spree was the Ancient. This is the one from the 8th edition launch box that I later found on ebay.  I prefer him over the one that GW currently sells in a claim shell pack. For a guy called "the Chaper Ancient" I thought it made since for him to have a helmet that reflected this concept. Also it's a call-back to the first Ultramarine models my brother I built back in '89 from the classic RTB01 kit. I left his banner detached at this time because I think it'll be easier to paint. 

"C"mon gimme a hand." 

All of these models will most likely get their own threads and posts here on the Chronicle at some point, either later this year or decade. But for now I'm celebrating getting so many models off of their sprues and frames and upright and sort of playable. Meanwhile, now that my wrist is starting to feel better I need to get back to the drawing board and focus on my 2-D art. 

Deathwatch Dreadnought (Part 1)

Is it Dreadtober time again? Indeed it is.  I decided this time around to finish up this Deathwatch Dreadnought. With GW discontinuing the model earlier this year I felt that this was the time to honor one of mine with a paint job. This is one of those classic "boxnoughts" that I think came in the 5th edition starter set (Blackreach). I acquired this in a lot along with a group of Space Marine Bikers and another, older, boxnought in metal. That one will require it's paint to be stripped off before I can do anything with it. But this one as you can see...

...is ready to go. I believe it was intended for a Blood Angels army, thus the blood red shoulders. I gritted up the base, leaving the single skull, and proceeded to get this one going.

I painted over the red and basecoated the base and skull. Actually I painted the skull using Corax White with the intention of using Skeleton Horde Contrast Paint over it. I opted not  to add any other debris to the base as the notion of a single, lonely, skull on such a large base is kind of amusing, and oddly striking. 

Ok, that's it for week one, not much progress I know, but this was ment as a 'kick-off' post. Check out part two next week to see how far I get.

It's Only War!

 Is there a better way to celebrate your birthday than a birthday bash? Or bashing? Probably.  But this is the fun we decided to have. 

"I'm next!"

Da Masta Cheef and I agreed to meet up for a 1,000 point game of Warhammer 40,000 10th edition. It was our first game of this shiny new edition, and we were eager to give it a go. We decided to play the Only War mission from the basic rulebook as it's a simple and straight forward game.  The objective was that we had to "table' the opponent (i.e. eliminate fully all elements of the opposing force)  and if by the end of Turn 5 that hasn't happened the winner will be determined by who has collected the most VPs. VPs are earned by claiming or holding Objectives. 

980 points of Tyranids.

My army only came up to 980 points due to the wonky way in which armies are built now, it was jusr not possible to find an extra 20 points anywhere with what I was bringing. My force consisted of a winged Hive Tyrant wth Venom Cannon, Two Brood Lords, one with Adaptive Biology and the other with Alien Cunning. Three stands of Rippers, two five-alien broods of Genestealers, two broods of ten termagants and a Screamer Killer. Only I left my Screamer Killer miniature at home so I borrowed Joah's Old One Eye model as a stand-in (and since the colors are basically the base colors for my army I agreed to paint the model for him).

Not really Old One Eye. 

The Space Marines were ...a whole lot of marines! They actually out-numbered the nids! This is Cheef's newest army, the Black Dragons. So forgive him if they appear in some pics to be the Primed Dragons or Bare Plastic Dragons as they are very much a work in progress. Led by a Chaplain and a Primaris Lieutenant, the mustered force was comprised of Assault Intercessors (5 troops) two squads of Intercessors, one with 5 troops the other with 10, a Hellblaster squad, an Infernus Squad, a unit of 5 Reivers, a Balistus Dreadnought and an Imperial Agents unit of Voidsmen-at-arms. 

995 points of Primaris Space Marines.

We chose the Only War mission from the main rulebook, as it seemed straightforward and simplified (but not simple). Naturally I would be playing  the Attacker.  Other than placing down the first unit the role of Attacker seemed to be little more than a title for this scenario. 

The field of battle. 

The battlelines we made seemed to be straightforward also, something a Napolionics player might admire. 

Astartes deployment.

I had my Genestealers, along with their accompanying Broodlords, take advantage of their Scout moves and scuttle 8" forward. 

Tyranid deployment (after Scout moves)

Cheef's Reivers moved up in the board edge, with the quip of "I'm not sure I need to get closer to the Tyranids." 

Reivers make their Scout move.

Turn One, Cheef won the roll-off to go first, and apart from moving units onto the closest objectives, not much really occurred. Oh, other than the Black Dragons wiped one of the Genestealer brood off of the table relying on Oath of Moment and the tools of the Primaris Lieutenant (Target Priority, Tactical Precision and Bolter Discipline) to effectively reduce the Genestealers to a spray of ichor and shattered chitin. Yikes! The Hive Tyrant arrived to take an objective in one of the round ruins. His Venom Cannon was ineffective against the Ballistus Dreadnought. In fact the Tyranids shooting was easily rebuffed by the Astartes. This was already feeling like an up hill climb for the Tyranids. 

End of Turn 1.

Turn two, and finally we could start claiming Objectives. The Black Dragons scored 2 vps.  The Tyranids would only claim 1 vp when their turn came around. The Black Dragons pushed hard on the Termagants, who were not wiped out, but pulled back to the ruins close enough to hold an objective.  Wounds were taken on the other Genestealers, Screamer Killer and the Hive Tyrant. Boldly the Black Dragons charged the Genestealers, and they were wiped out, except for the Broodlord who held on fighting. His counter attack wiped out the Assault Intercessors until it was just the Broodlord and the Chaplain facing off. By the Tyranids Turn 2, they were only able to score the single VP. 

Pappa Claws about to let it rip. 

On Turn Three both sides were able to claim 3 VPs each, with the Black Dragons still in the lead and ahead on the attrition rate. I had hoped to change that with the Hive Tyrant, whose impotent shooting was starting to annoy me, so I moved him off of the objective allowing the Ripper Swarm to hold it instead. He flew up, shooting his Venom Cannon again only to have the Balistus Dreadnought shrug it off again. So the Hive Tyrant declared a charge, he was only 5" away,  and after he survived the overwatch shots and... I rolled double 1's! Naturally I had to cash in a CP to get a re-roll, only to defy all odds and roll ...another pair of ones! Snakes-eyes twice in a row?! Nuts! We all had a good laugh over it, and Kushail was even there to witness this spectacular fumble. 

Come on, it's only 5"! 

It wasn't all laughs though, as the Screamer Killer closed on a unit of Primaris fiends and reduced them to admantite coated beef jerky chunks. 

For those about to be ripped apart, we salute you!

Turn 4 was upon us, and the Black Dragons pointed every available gun and special shenanigan available at the Hive Tyrant, until finally a gernade toppled the mighty beast. The tussle between the Chaplain and the Broodlord continued until the Chaplain overcame his foe with his mighty beat-stick (TM).

"Once you were bigger, now I am the giant!"

Yikes! On my Turn 4, I was left with a shattered army, with no synapse available for any additional support,  While the Black Dragons held on to their cleansing advance. 

The Black Dragons press on.

Ar the bottom of Turn 4 I had moved the Screamer Killer to an Objective on the hill, while my lurking Termagants claimed another objective and the Rippers held on to theirs. The score was now 8 vps for the Space Marines, and 7 vps for the Tyranids.  But now ot was tome foe some vengeance. I had the Screamer Killer charge in an eviscerated the 10-man Primaria unit along with the accompanying Primaris Lieutenant. He consolidated back toward the objective since there were no other target units within range. 

Flank taken! 

The Reivers, despite losing three of their unit, were unwavering in their resolve and eliminated the last of the termagants by the ruins where the Rippers controlled the objective. They consolidated into the Rippers, whose counter attack was little more than  a nuisance to the Reivers. 

Turn 5, the last round, and it was looking like the nids were needing a miracle. The Black Dragons were now methodically cleaning up the remaining xenos infestation. The Infernus Squad immolated the last squad of Termagants, and served the objective. 

Objecrive secured -with fire!

The Balistus Dreadnought turned it's sights onto the Screamer Killer, who was still above half strength, and lanced it like a boil. 

Long distance lancing. 

Finally the Reivers proved their worth by tearing up the last of the Rippers. "What's the point of these again?" The Reiver Sgt asked fasciously after spitting out a ripper tail. 

The Ripper's last stand. 

And here we are at the bottom of Turn 5, and Tyranids have no assets left. The VPs proved to not matter in the end as the xenos threat has been utterly eliminated the Black Dragons win the day! 

Zone secured. 

So, that was our first 10th edition game. Other than agreeing that Battleshock is a great name for a ruleset that didn't seem to matter, the game played just fine. But it was the little things that tripped us (mostly me) up. Like my completely forgetting about the Termagant's Skulking Horrors ability (a way over sold name, all-things considering). That could have kept them alive a bit longer. But there was not a strategy to undo rolling snake-eyes for a 5" charge and rolling them again with a reroll. The Tyranids MVP was the Screamer Killer, the model of which I was borrowing. MVP on the Marine side... I think I will say it was the Chaplain, only for his heroic stand against the Broodlord. 

He fought for his life, Chapter, and a paint job. 

Fun game as always, we had a lot of laughs, and I learned a lot about these bugz as well as the new edition. Hopefully the new knowledge will make for a more successful fight in their (and my) next game. 

My '90s Space Marine Challenge

Here is my entry in the #90smarinechallenge. 

If you read my post announcing my intent to participate, you night know that I was not sure how to paint my model.  After hearing everyone who offered an opinion, it was clear that the masses wanted me to paint an Ultramarine, so who was I to stand against the will of the masses?*

Here are the stages I went through:

Primed. 

Basecoats.

For the basecoats I used a very old color  one of the oldest paints in my menagerie of paints: Space Marine Blue. It came in the "89 Space Marine Paints set, and it still works great. 

Attachments basecoated. 

On the gun, the eye lenses and aquilla gem stone, I used Khorne Red. 

Macrage Blue.

Macrage Blue, the modern Ultramarines base coat, was the midcoat color of choice. 

The '90s Ultramarines Blue 

Then came another oldie, the "90s era Ultramarines Blue. I think itt has a "kick" that modern blue colors in this tone seem to lack. 

Highlights.

Fenrisian Grey is the final highlight on the armor. It was at this point I painted the trim on the paldrons in the third company red. 

And some final details.

Without going into the full saga of it all, the decals proved to be their typical challenge. But Microset, 'Ard Coat, and pure tenacity eventually got me results I could live with. 

Chapter badge applied.

Sadly, I had forgotten that the bolter covers up the gemstone on the aquilla. A revelation all too evident after the fact. -And I thought I had done a decent job on it too! All well, if I decide to paint up more of these guys I will try to keep that fact in mind. 

Tactical Marking applied.

Finished with tufts.

The temptation to add additional decals on his greaves was very appealing. A campaign badge,, or roman numeral three, etc. But this fanciful idea was thrown out by the challenge of the shoulder pads. Sure, they're flatter areas and more susceptible to the decals, but I was just over it. And that's okay, as I think the legs have turned out good. And sometimes, less is more, and it's best not to make the model appear too busy, right?

Stay tuft. 

All-in-all I am very pleased with how this chap turned out. He is a vast improvement over the his battle brothers of the same design that I painted way back in the late '90s. If you look at the post from way back when I got these Ultramarines from my brother, you can see a ten-man squad of these guys painted as Veterans. Feel free to compare and contrast**. 

 

It's been a fun challenge, and I hope Darren throws another one out there soon. 

*Alright, it was like five people. Maybe six.

**Pun not intended, but there it is!