Genestealer #10

 This is only the 10th Genestealer I have painted (if we discount the hybrids and Patriach). So, yeah, I just finished a squad, or rather a brood, of ten models. The first few were painted while I was still living in the U.K. way back in 1992.  Three decades for one unit... kind of impressive huh?

Basecoats.

Genestealer #9 was finished last year and this critter was supposed to join him at that time but it just didn't happen.  So here we are now with the opportunity to get him done. I followed the steps discussed in Genestealer Killteam #2 with a few changes. 

Mostly done.

The biggest change was not using my ancient Citadel Worm Purple and instead using Xereus Purple and Genestealer Purple with a final highlight of Kakophoni Purple.  

Genestealer #10 and #9. 

He's probably not the best of my painted Genestealers, but in a large group he'll look just fine. 

"Fear not men, we have lasguns!" 

And, even with just a single addition, Hivefleet Neverness grows...

Corsair: The Face Of The Void (Review)

 

Corsair: The Face Of The Void is an audio drama* written by James Swallow. 

This is a bit different than your typical 40k story, and yet it was quite entertaining. To sum up, a ship called The Corsair carrying a Rogue Trader, Captain Santiago, and her crew, who are chasing down a pirate ship (which at one point it is said that they are "abhumans") which is trying to reach a warp-jump point to escape. They are putting up quite a fight when it appears to disappear. When the ship reappears it seems suddenly derelict and abandoned. They board it only to discover that the ship appears to be extremely old and decayed despite not being that old (by Imperium standards anyway). They are attacked by warpghosts whom they determine were the crew who were trapped on this ship went it went through the temporal event that aged the ship. They're also attacked by a single Chaos Marine who proves to be a bit of scary, if not 2-D, kind of a chap. 

They find the cargo which is clearly xenos in origin and very likely worth a lot of money due to the reward on it.  They know per the reward stipulations that they are to bring that crate back unopened and intact. But the crate has other plans...

+++SPOILERS AHEAD +++

The cargo is Dhokar, a Necron Chronomancer (it's also called a Cryptek) held in stasis. And, with not too much effort, it escapes the stasis and begins an assault on the ship. It summons necrons to it and it starts taking over the ship. I loved this guy's dialogue: "I have no more need for you organic!" as he disintegrates a guy. "You. Will. Pay for that. Organic wretch!" he curses the Aeldari Ranger during the battle. However the Captain and her crew figure out how to defeat the necrons by ejected them into the warp by opening an airlock. "You, will not escape us, fleshborn!" he shouts while being pulled out into the abyss, where the daemonic forces wait eagerly to feed upon them.  

Narrowly escaping the warp themselves, the Corsair translates back into our reality only to find itself surrounded by an Imperial war fleet. They get the crew to stand down and the Captain and her aeldari Ranger escort go to the flagship where they are have an audience with the Tetriarch Queen Belletane herself. It was the Queen who had purchased the stasis box with the Necron inside of it. After pirates stole her good she is the one who put out the bounty for her item. Now she has tracked down the vessel that retrieved box with the intention of taking it and screwing the Corsair crew out of it's reward, only to find that they had jettisoned it in the warp. Santiago uses the threat of reporting the Tetriarch Queen to the Ordo Xenos to sort of parley with her. The Queen agrees to allow Santiago and the Corsair crew go but they are restricted to her sector. 

That was the seriously abridged summary. The audio drama itself has a lot of nuances and personality to all the characters that often distracts from the plot. 

• Did I like it? I did. But it's kind of a hot mess. My first impression was that it reminded me of those BBC radio dramas I used to listen to. Or the Dr Who audio stories that Big Finish produces. But there is a lot of energy to this story, almost chaotically so. 
• Was it hard to put down? This isn't a book, but the concept is that same: did I lose focus on the story? No. Being that there are different voice actors for the characters, as opposed to a a guy reading a book to you, it was a lot easier to engage and follow this story. 
• Could I care about the characters? Some of them, yes. The Eldar Ranger in the crew is so....ELF, that it must have pained Mr Swallow to not have a dwarf in the crew for him to banter with. I did like how the other characters talk about him, referring to him as an 'it' devoid of humanity. Back to that Chaos Marine, by scary, imagine if a Chaos Space Marine were to appear on Scooby Doo. His dialogue was pretty much yells of "Enemies!" and other bellowing declarations. Icaylian the psyker was an interesting character but she seemed predictably fragile. The Enginseer with a death wish was a fun character. 
• Did the writer truly grasp how the 'world' of the 41st millennium works in the sense that it doesn't betray or retcon previously established (as I know it) lore? Yes. This was a fun story and it felt like how a Rogue Trader RPG adventure would play out. 
• Was I being talked down too? The way Captain Santiago talked was in a constant tone of derisive annoyance. She was annoyed by everyone and everything and seemed like nothing couldn't piss her off. Since she's essentially the main character, you couldn't help but feel a bit of her wrath. "I'll shoot you in that damned excuse for a face if you don't do your damned job Kyteal, MORE SPEED NOW!!!"  
• How predictable is this story? The first half of the story kind of is, but the last act with the Tetriach Queen was quite different. Clearly the ending of this drama was setting up a continuity in the hopes that this would become a series. In an interview with James Swallow he stated that this was set up as basically a pilot episode to a bigger story but since this came out in 2018 (it's halfway through 2023 at the time of this writing) I'm doubtful that a sequel is forthcoming.  
• Do I recommend this book audio drama? By no means is this a vital story, and it's probably not worth seeking out, but if you stumble upon this and want to be entertained, then yes, go for it. 

*A fancy word for "Play". 

Termagant Fun! (Part 3)

 Inspired by the recent distraction caused by the old school Hunter Screamer I recently painted, I felt compelled to paint up a few more Termagants. Since the last time I dabbled on these guys it only netted me a single fully painted model. 

Well now I have a painted squad of five. Which is only half-way towards the minimum unit size. So... progress? 

It allowed me to experiment a bit with the basecoats. I painted two of them using different Contrast Paints for the purple areas. Leviathan Purple was a bit too dark my tastes. The other one, Luxion Purple worked a bit better. The other two were done using the method I described in Part 2. But when they were all done, I like the Luxion Purple one the best. I guess it's the wariness of the hue. Probably why the Indian Red I used on some of my other nid models appeals to me also.  I am thinking that the other five models will probably be painted this way. 

Luxion Purple basecoat. 

Fast forward to the highlights stage: I used Kakophoni Purple as my final highlight on the Purple areas and White Scar as a final highlight on the blue area. I skipped the White Scar step on the Hunter Screamer and I am trying to decide if I need to revisit that model or not...

Finished model.

All-in-all I am pleased with how they turned out. In the pic below you can see them joining up with the lone gaunt (he's on the far left) from Part Two to form their half squad. Oh, their guns are slightly different colors from each other as I played around with different colors to wash over their bone colored base in an attempt at getting the best look for those fleshborers. 

The brood grows .

That's all for now, hopefully I will get the squad painted up to the minimum squad size soon. 

Classic Hunter Screamer Lives!

 

Primed to scream and shout.. 

With the announcement of Warhammer 40,000  10th edition, we were shown some of the new models. One of the most impressive models that stood out from the rest was the new Hunter Screamer which was inspired by the original Rogue Trader era model. This got me thinking about that original model (nostalgicly) and lamenting that I never built or painted mine (which I won as a door prize for an event at a comic shop in Bristol VA* way back 1994). 

Original paint scheme from White Dwarf 145. **

As I mentioned back when I built my Deathwatch Venerable Dreadnought, I have a bunch of resin bits that a friend,  who was experimenting with resign casting,  gave to me a few decades ago.  It turns out that I had enough scraps to build one of these guys. Which is great as I hesitate to build that old metal kit until I have figured out a paint scheme for him. This knock-off will be a good experiment for that as I won't be too frustrated or fussed if I screw it up.

Basecoats.

 For the most part I stuck with the color scheme that I used on my Genestealers, but if you look at this old model (and some of the nid models that followed it) there are some area of the models that look sinewy and have the appearance of exposed muscle.  It seemed to me that a third color needed to be explored to distinguish this different aspect of the model. So I stuck with the  Indian Red base and added Screamer Pink with a layer of Pink Horror. I toned that down with a glaze of Carroburg Crimson.

Mid coats.

That gave those areas a nice "meaty" kind of look huh? At this point I was considering putting some 'ard Coat over it for a more gristle-like vibe. 

With such a bigger model it made sense to me add some additional colors for sake of depth. One the purple areas I added a highlight of

And on the blue areas I used Calgary Blue.

The claws were saved for last. Even the original 'Eavy Metal painters, who were the first people to ever paint these models, wanted to paint them in a red color. That look made one think of lobsters of crabs, although fine, just wasn't coming to work with my colors. So I decided to go with a subtle purple highlight on a mostly black area. I used Xereus Purple for this (which, to my amusement, is a close match to that old Worm Purple paint) with a glaze of Druchii Violet, an edge highlight of  Genestealer Purple

followed by another glaze of Druchii Violet. The claws looked great while the wash was wet and I decided to keep that look so I capped it off with a a layer of 'Ard Coat. Remember I thought that might look good earlier and I was glad I trusted my intuition on this one. 

The 'Ard Coat on the meaty bitz really worked out I think.  It gives a complimentary differentiation without clashing or blending in with the other colors. 

I used Scorpion Green, Yreil Yellow and Tesseract Glow on the plasma glows on his torso and in it's mouth. I wanted them to stand out without being overwhelming and I think it worked. 

I added a few stray grass tufts to the base and it was done. 

Grass added.

Done and really for the fun! 

I took it outside for some natural lighting shots but it was noon and the shadows were far too intense on my front steps. 

Nothing to devour here...

So I took into the woods and didn't get much better results, but it was fun to try it. 

*or TN. I forget which side of the street that original location was on. 

"I will devour this place!!!"

** Image Copyright Games Workshop, used here for review purposes, no challenge intended. 

Nurgling Ripper Rider (Objective Marker)

Giddy up!

Just like the title says, it's a nurgling riding a tyranid ripper. One of the more amusing things to come from the wilderness of 3D printing. Luckily the ever resourceful Warfrog got one of these for me. And after the initial laughter subsided it occurred to me that it would make for a rather unique objective marker. So I attached it a 40mm base, applied the grit, and took it out for a priming of Corax White. 

The ghost of mischief past.

And here comes the fun! 

Now in glorious technicolor. 

Most of the basecoats were done using Contrast Paints. They were worked very well on this figure bringing out much of the details. Plaguebearer Flesh was used on that cheeky nurgling. Blood Angels Red was used onbthe mushroom caps. Skeleton Horde was used on boney areas and teeth. Both have a their tongues poking out of their mouth and for that I used Volupus Pink.  For non-contrast paints I used Citadel Colour Macrage Blue and Xereus Purple for the Ripper's body. 

Mostly done.

I used Russ Grey and Coat D'arms Lupus Grey for the blue areas of the Ripper. I think this turned out OK for the most part. I'm more satisfied with the purple areas. That was done by applying a layer of Slaanesh Grey then a Druchii Violet wash.  Then another conservative application of Slaanesh Grey but just on it's little pseudo-pod legs. 

View from behind.

I decided to just leave the nurgling alone. The Plaguebearer Contrast paint worked brilliantly. I did put a little thinned Agrax Earthshade in some if the recesses around his most prominent folds and the line of his back,  but that was it.

Grasd tufts added.

Once the tufts were added I called him done. For those keeping count, this is the second Objective Marker that I have completed.  I just need to crank out at least four more for a set of six. But I have ideas, and I have gathered models, to go far beyond that; it's just a matter of time right?

Have you ever needed to secure an objective so bad?

World Eaters Jakhals (Part 1)

 Here is a series I had hoped to kick off back in February, but due to the tedious assembly time I only just this week managed to finish building these guys. Granted, my free time is sparse to say the least and this kit did a fine job consuming it. 

The first guy I built was the biggest one, the Dishonoured.  

The Dishonoured.

This guy was way more complicated than he needed to be. Take his spike ball arm for example: it is hollow with skulls in it with an additional piece for the chain that wraps around the wrists. I have no idea how I will paint those skulls but I will ford that river when I get to it. Thiswasn't even the most tedious part of this model's assembly though,

The backpack has three chem tanks that could have been designed to go together easier,  but the nightmare was part 82. Part 82 is a series of wire tubes that run from the chem tanks to the back of this guy's head. They do not easily go together at all and after some time I just had to stop and hope that he will look alright when painted. 

The individual models in this unit were a bit tricky to assemble too ad they all have tiny arms that have tinier connection points for each weapon. The weapon choices themselves were all excellent and made for a very interesting set of choices. However they all connect at the wrist of the aforementioned fiddly arms. 

Check out the women of the unit, who are armed with a pair of chain weapons each,  who all have that same arm to weapon connection. 

The ladys of the chainsaw bloodbath.

This guy was, in my opinion, the easiest one to build. He looks like he could do some serious harm to someone with that thing. 

The Leader of the pack. I chose the wrist mounted chainsaw for his left arm simply because ai thought it looked cool.

Jakhal Pack Leader. 

The rest of the Jakhals are all in crazy running poses. They're dynamic as heck and should be a lot of fun to paint. 

Like I said to some of my friends, they're a lot of work for fodder, but they're going to be really good looking fodder. 

Next up I need to grit their bases and prime them before diving into the painting...

Feeling Khorney (Part 13)

 Part 13? Crikey, this one has gone on for a bit huh? Well, I have completed (sans decals and grass tufts)  three more of the "dancers & prancers" Khorne Berserkers. These are the models from the 20-ish year old kit. Which I started working on many years ago. 

Three more done-ish.

I admit that they aren't my cleanest paint jobs but they look good enough in a jumble. Trevor thinks my style sometimes leans in a Blanchitsu style which I think is an acceptable compliment, and is complementary of the chaos ascetic. 

"This is my murder stick!"

These models have so many damn bolts and  rivets that I keep finishing more that I have missed while reviewing these photos. I could keep touching them up but eventually I just have to let 'em go and move on to the next thing. 

"Klytus, I'm bored,"

I like this guy, he reminds me of General Klytus*, Ming's henchman from the 1980 Flash Gordon movie. He has the most unique plasma pistol in all of 40k. It's really archaic looking and fierce and has the smallest plasma coil on any plasma pistol ever produced including the small ones from the old Confrontation sprue and the first plastic Orks set.  I think this turned out good however. 

View of plasma pistol.

This guy is running full tilt at something. He really needs to just get there, y'know? He could be running away, or towards food...

"Pizza!!!"

So I keep saying done-ish and that is because I am waiting for the whole unit to be done before I add decals and grass to the base. 

Ready to collect blood and skulls! 

I have six more of these psychos left to complete. And that doesn't include the squad leaders. The grind continues...

*General Klytus. This chap had a particularly gruesome demise.