The Doctor's Dark Angels Part 2

Work on my own minis has been slow, and what progress I have made is sort of not blog-worthy (at least not yet) so before I dash our of town again for business (with my portable Neverness Kit of course) I figured I would post the rest of the Dark Angels that I painted back in '99 for my old pal "the Doctor", who, for professional reasons, we've agreed to keep his identity vague.

Any way, what we have here is a Dark Angel's Rhino based off the original Rogue Trader era plastic kit The dozer blade is from the 1st vehicle accessory sprue that came with the Leman Russ tank models. I watched him cut the thing right in half, trim it a bit, and re-glue it. Such a simple conversion, yet I know I would probably screw this up bad if I tried it myself. The end result was a far more dynamic dozer blade, with the more of a vicious plow effect going on. I can imagine this thing plowing it's way down crowded streets...anyway, you get the, um, point!

Yes that's a storm bolter in the front of the plow. He decided to do unique customizing to the top, using the metal components from the 2nd edition era Whirlwind kit. Unfortunately this left no where for the storm bolter to go, so we stuck it there after having a good chuckle over it (more on this in a minute).

This next pic is the rear hatches. I do not recall why he decided to make the rear doors that way, but I suppose it works.

A note on the twin barrels for the exhausts. I really wanted them too look old and weathered. Sort of belying a greater sense of age to this machine than the paint job would suggest. Also, according to the doctor it was my idea to make his Dark Angels be from the 2rd chapter. I supposed my only reasoning for this was that I liked the way the Red contrasts against that dark green. The red on the top hatch is solid primary color, which I wanted have pop has intensely as I could get it. All these years later I still think that works well.

Also, all the satchels and kit all over this Rhino came from the Tamiya kits for customizing WWII kits that you can get pretty much anywhere.

Now in case you were wondering why this rhino has such a strange big flat area on it's back hatch...

...it is because it is not always a Rhino!

Presenting the original version of the Whirlwind. This is the result of following the instructions in White Dwarf 117 (someone correct me if this is wrong!) for scratch-building Whirlwinds! This is what they looked like in the orignal Epic games as well. The coversion was mostly plexy card, the bottom of the large 30mm monster base, and an extra set of the hatch handles from the Rhino kit. And a flat magnet.

The pulled back antenna are just brass wire, but we both agreed it added to the effect. You can also get a view of my least favorite decal ever, the 2-part whirlwind aquila for the side doors. Doc insisted on using some bonding solution from somewhere that has caused it to yellow prematurely. I couldn't talk him out of it. Still, I have never seen this decal look good on any tank, accept the 'eavy metal team's tanks...but ultimately i think it works here well. I think on future tanks he should use a 3-dimensional aquilla instead.

Ok, so was had this HUGE area that opened up behind the dozer plow, and we had no where for the storm bolter to go. So we came up with this bizarre hazing ritual: stick a guy right up front! Imagine the hail of expended shells discharging rapidly from the blazing storm bolter while this scream guy ar the front is yelling "yeah! Get some! yeah!!!" at the top his lungs. Also, we added ALOT of sublte battle damage to the front of this take to indicate that most of the guys going through this hazing, probably don't live through it...

And finally, the aquila is from the metal Thunderhawk kit.
Alright, that's all for now. Any questions? Just leave a comment!

Sven vs. the Inquisition

Last night I battled Da Masta Cheef and his Inquisitional forces on the broken world of...Endlessbattleastan (just made that up, I have no idea what we're calling his warzone). After our Dark Heresy session was cancelled we decided to add another chapter in the ongoing friction between Wolflord Sven Axegrinder and the radical elements of the Inquisition. Seriously, there is a history here, and before I proceed with the battle synopsis (and explain the pic of the green Bloodletter above -don't they look like they're playing craps? LOL) I shall share that history with you...

Sven has been my Wolf Lord since at least as far back as the day the 3rd edition SW Codex was released, but he may have been around as far back as the last days of 2nd edition. The model I use is an old RT Terminator Captain (they're be an article/showcase on him eventually, fear not!). He's tangled with Warfrog's 'nids on countless occasions and stymied Da Cheef's forces for years. One day back in '09, we were supposed to get together for a mega-battle. Da Cheef and I were sending these in-character transmissions to each other to hype ourselves up. We were supposed to be playing against Warfrog's Eldar (Xenos scum!!!) but I had a scheduling conflict arise and couldn't come. With feelings of abandonment, Cheef's IG were forced to take on the Eldar (Xenos scum!!) on they're own. This led to more in-character transmissions which led to declarations of suspicion that the IG force were in fact infested with the taint of Chaos, however the Inquisition instead tried to accuse the SW force of heresy and treason by stating that the IG force did not actually appear on any formal Munitorium inventory rolls, and that the whole thing was a concoction invented to avoid combating the Eldar (Xenos scum!!!), here is that Inquisitional communique and the SW responce:

FAO: Wolfpriest Jorvik

TRANSMITTED: CLASSIFIED

RECEIVED: Colcha

DATE:4916998.M41

TELEPATHIC DUCT: Astropath-terminus: CLASSIFIED

AUTHOR: Inquisitor Kemp, Ordo Hereticus

CLEARANCE LEVEL: Magenta

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: It is not your right to question, only to obey.

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

There is no Colonel by the name of 'Extra hands' Straken, nor a 728th Sabbat

Irregulars listed within the ranks of the Emperor's most glorious Imperial

Guard. Further inquiries as to the identies of those you have mentioned above

has garnered the attention of the Ordo Hereticus. As such I have taken command

of this investigation and am aboard my cruiser 'Interrogator' which is enroute

to rendevous with your strike cruiser for further investigation. You and your

crew will stand down and submit to MY authority upon my arrival, and will

cooperate fully with any 'cleansing' operations should they be necessary. The

thought of the Astartes being so easily misguided by, if not outright consorting

with the ruinous powers is one that shall be quashed with much haste & vigor!

The Emporer Protects.

Inquisitor Kemp

-Ordo Hereticus-

FROM JOEL

FAO: Inquisitor Kemp, Ordo Hereticus

TRANSMITTED: Colcha

RECEIVED: Scintilla

DATE:4918997.M41

TELEPATHIC DUCT: Astropath-terminus: Loki

AUTHOR: Wolfpriest Jorvik

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: Men can be replaced, data is precious.

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

Lord kemp, we are not surprised to once again bear witness to your witless

observations and shortsighted determinations with regards to imminent threats to

the Imperium we hold dear. Of course "There is no Colonel by the name of 'Extra

hands' Straken, nor a 728th Sabbat Irregulars listed within the ranks of the

Emperor's most glorious Imperial Guard." It's what they have come to call

themselves! Do you honestly think to believe that a group of traitors would

resubmit to the Departmento Munitorium a name change after they turn traitor?

No, why, in their current guise they can continue to seek requisitions and

supplies thus not only draining the Imperial Guard of resources, but by also

acting in a manner counter-productive to the aims and wishes of the

Administratum. Besides the obvious act of subterfuge, if such a group were

bold/stupid enough to attempt such a request, it would take decades for the

change to actually occur! We both know that the Administratum is not known for

expediency. For example, we're still waiting to hear back on our Request of

Censure against you for that decision you made six years ago to pull back the

Imperial Guard that we were sent to support against a combined Tau and Necro

assault. You stated on the Voxcast that the regional Governor's botanical

gardens were to be protected at all costs, leaving us to pursue the routing Tau

(we're still happy to have crushed the Necrons in the campaign). When advised

against this decision, you had the Guard fire upon our force. If the Tau were

not a bigger threat at the time, your bones would be lining our wolf kennels.

Back on the point, `Extra Hands' Straken, and his 728th Sabbat Irregulars,

regardless of whether or not you can produce a record of their existence, will

be pacified. We welcome you to join us –from a distance- in monitoring their

destruction, but if you intend or dare to assume that the sons of Russ will heel

to a paper-pushing simpleton, you better not show up with a pack of women this

time.

Chewing up Treachery,

-Jorvik.

Needless to say we met in glorious battle! The Space Wolves were victorious, but only technically. Many a wolf-brother died to the undignified and dishonorable chemtanks of the irregulars, but most humbly Sven Axegrinder fell to lasguns! Revealed in this battle was the Renegade Inquisitor, 'The Khornedog' whose treachery set up this ambush against Sven and his battle brothers. So like a dog chasing a car, Sven has been seeking out these rogue elements ever since, determined to extract retribution!

And tonight, it happened, sort of... it would appear the Inquisition really doesn't like when you attack one of theirs even if they are bit 'radical'. The Inquisition, led by this guy, Matt Fucking Ward, caught up to Sven's battlebarge Ragnar's Breath, and taking a prisoner (some Lonewolf who's name I can't recall) they proceeded to publicly torture and humiliate him in order to entice Sven into their trap. Of course it worked brilliantly.

The Inquisition list (I think this is it, Cheef correct me if I'm wrong) can be reviewed here: http://dlwdg.blogspot.com/2011/10/my-gk-failing-circus.html

The force I brought to the table was:

# of models in unit	Unit Type	Unit name	Points	Notes
1	HQ	Wolf Lord Sven	175	IC,
		Terminator w/SB, Power Fist, Wolftooth Necklace, Wolftail Talisman, Saga of Beastslayer
1	HQ	Rune Priest master of Runes	195	IC
		Psi: Jaws of WW, StormCaller, Runic Weap, Term/SB, Chooser of Slain, WTN, WTT,
10	TROOPS	Grey Hunters	255	AV for rhino
		Powerfist, Meltagun, plasma gun. Rhino with additional storm bolter, extra armor, Hunter killer
9	TROOPS	Grey Hunters		AV for rhino
		Powerfist, Meltagun,.Wolfstandard, Rhino with additional storm bolter, extra armor, Hunter killer	250
1	FA	Landspeeder Tornado	70
		Heavy flamer, multi-melta
1	HEAVY	Vindicator	130
		Demolisher Cannon, Storm Bolter, Searchlight, Smoke Lr, Extra Armor
6	HEAVY	Long Fang Pack	185
		SL: PF. MB. LC, MLx2, MMx2,
	ELITES	Wolf Guard Pack*	55	Drop Pod
		(see below for individual breakdown)
1	ELITE	WG Thorgar	43
		Terminator w/Sb, Powerfist
1	ELITE	WG Svengi	43
		Terminator w/Sb, Powerfist
1	ELITE	WG Tor	63
		Terminator w/assault cannon, Powerfist
1	ELITE	WG Ygarl	38	GH2
		Power armor, bol pistol, frag/kraf grenades, wolf claw, melta bombs
TOTAL
33			1502

 It was a Capture and Control /Dawn of War scenario. The Lone Wolf being one object and the other a herectical piece of archeotech that had to be controled.  It was sort of a rough start, with my notorious dice undermining me in random ways. Without going all full blown battle-report, I will sum up the highlights:

•  Sven lands in a drop pod with 3 Wolfguard and engages the enemy! Despite the hail of bullets and deathwind missiles, the enemy loses only 2 models! Eventually, Sven cuts these foes down, but not before losing the Drop Pod's DW missile to the autocannons of the inquisition Dreadnought.
• The Longfangs are undermined by the rules of Dawn of War, and before they can even get into a good position have lost members of their unit. To make matters worse, when they finally get into a good position, the dice gods deny them their glory! They are eventually cut down by the concentrated fired of the Inquisition tanks.

This next batch of highlight all happened in the last turn of the game.

• My old school Landspeeder Tornado ("The Flying Chair-lift of Death") hounded a chimera for the entire game. Neither vehicle could get the upperhand until, on like turn 4, I blew up the Chimera with the Tornado's multimelta. After surviving a stormbolter attack, the heavy flamer toasted the unit, but still, seemingly fearless and ever defiant, the storm-bolter weilding guardsman stood readying for the next round...

• The pic at the top of this post shows my Wolf Guard and a squad of Grey Hunters eliminating the last of the Daeomonhosts (Cheef hates the official models, and, when I think about it, these -alternately colored Bloodletters- are probably a better idea anyway) to take the objective and free the Lone Wolf. (Who is within 3 inches on the otherside of the wall).
• Matt Fucking Ward shows up and dives out of his Landraider Cruesader like some dreamy fan-boy action star and utterly destroys my Runepriest (through a window! LOL!)

• Seeing the GK embodiment of everything wrong with the Grey Knights Codex standing before me (and hearing Cheef tell me everything that he can do and for how little points!) I knew that my guys, who had just bailed out of their Rhino to take possession of the STC tech objective, would not last long against that combat monster! Not to mention that the Rhino bearing Inquisitor Corteaz was bearing down on them super fast as well! So I whipped the Vindicator around, and stood there wondering what to shoot. MFW's Cruesader, even if I penetrated it I probably would do something lame like shoot off a gun or something, or worse scatter on to my tightly packed Grey Hunters in the crater...

The Grey Hunters opened on MFW, but only score a single wound. Then the Vindicator targeted him and scored a direct hit, send Matt Fucking Ward back to oblivion.

• Sven Axegrinder and the final Wolfguard shoot their remaining shots at the Dreadnought that had been hasseling them the whole game, but they just can't take it out.

So, with a roll of the die, the game ended! And lucky it did too. I honestly did not know if my Grey Hunters at the crater could hold that objective. Yeah, MFW was dead, but Corteaz was about to hop out and bring some pain. Not to mention that pain-in-the-ass Landraider Cruesader was more than ready to cut them down as well. The dreadnought above was ignoring Sven and the WG, and had been picking off my GH at the Lonewolf objective for a few rounds now, and could, if so much as one more casualty had occurred, have forced a LD test that probably (as fickle as my dice roll) forced me to route off the objective or worse, actually kill them!

All in all, a fun game, although at the halfway point we were both annoyed by our dice not wanting to cooperate with us. But, I stuck to the mission objectives and managed to pull off a win.

...I'm afraid Sven might have truly caught the eve of the Inquisition now! ...

The Doctor's Dark Angels Pt 1

I stopped by the Doctor's house again to spend an evening with his lovely family and some friends. During the visit he showed me some of this work in progress on his Dark Angels army. In the process he pulled out some models I painted for him back around 1999. An RT era Space Marine Commander, SM Librarian, and Dark Angel Captain.

I'm impressed with how well these still hold up (I believe I said "Why the heck did I not choose to play Dark Angels?!") This old SM Commander is interesting. I really seemed have no issue at all with slapping iconography and decals all over the Doctor's models, yet I seem to think I tend to be some what conservative about that with my Space Wolves...

I have always loved this classic model and always wanted to paint him. Still, to this day, I feel this is GW's best Librarian model. There is just no way he would look right in a Space Wolf army though, and I recall begging to paint this for the Doctor.

Looking at it years later, we're both still pleased with it. In particular I like how 'brown' I made the pages of his book appear, to give the impression that his book was really old and well referenced. Odd choice of color on the force sword, I wish I could recall how I did it...

I was really thrilled with seeing this model again, I really think he holds up well for me! That power sword in particular I just had to get a pic of for my own reference.

He ordered a bunch of those caped back-packs for his HQ choices back then. I really miss the days of the Bitz program...actually this model might have came with it, but the Librarian did not.

 I really impress myself with just how much of the metallic green I used on this guy! It really compliments the over all color scheme quite well.

....and here's a teaser that I will discuss at length in part 2!  I hope you enjoyed!

Warfrog's Red Terror

My old pal Warfrog recently posted pics of a model I painted for him a few years back.His pics are vastly superior to the ones I'm posting here and I encourage you to check them out! For some odd reason I can't post the reply to his page, so I'm posting it here with a link to his page:
http://warfrog.blogspot.com/2011/10/red-terror.html#comment-form

'Thanks! And thanks for the pics! These look better than the ones I took.

This was a difficult model to paint, at least in the way that I was visualizing it. I wanted the red to blend from dark to bright, with the tail being black and getting more intense as the color proceeded up the torso. Sounds easy enough, but it took me a long to to get it to a point where I was satisfied with it. I wanted the weird "ribby-gutty" bitz to look as meaty as possible. I used a very old discontinued Citadel color, 'titillating pink' which I dulled up to a white, and then red-washed with ink until I was satisfied that it looked nasty enough. I also did the same thing with the mouth, but I did more layers to try to get a brighter, more snake-like feel. Oddly, by the time I completed this model the Red Terror was out of the Codex. Still, we have fond mirthful memories of the RT eating a Great Unclean One! (in the 1st 3rd ed Chaos Codex, the GUO was way underpowered!).' -Neverness

The Portable Neverness

As some of you know, or might have read, I travel a lot for business, and as a result, often my hobby time is neglected. Worse yet, the relaxing escape that mini-painting brings me is not available when I need it most. So my dear friend, Mrs. Bink, introduced me to a solution that I already had: go portable!

Years ago I got (either as a gift or I bought it myself, I can't recall) a small tackle box. I want to say we got this at K-Mart. It's original purpose was to be used as a place to store, divide and subdivide my various gaming dice. Dumping all of those into another tackle box I proceeded, at her kind suggestion, to organize this into a portable paint box/station/mini-carrier. This particular box divides into two sections.

The top section:

Fits the smaller paint pots perfectly, the rear groove fits the older paints well too. The front is perfect for brushes, etc. The bins are customizable and I can 'slot' in or out the dividers. Mrs. Bink also suggest that the inside of the top could be used as a palate or workstation. Not sure if I will do that however...

The bottom is far bigger and can store most GW vehicles! Here I have things like glues, clippers, decals, a water bottle, etc.



The models I brought with me on this trip are store securely and snug in this bottom (with some bits stored in the top half of the box)

These are two land speeders, one you might have seen some work in progress shots of in a prior blog, and the other one is the next one I will tackle. Also, being that the main blog is called 'Pods to drop...' I have brought a drop pod on sprue (pre-primed) and still in it's box, which I hope to get a good start on during the week that I'm up here.

If you're curious in the exact model of this box, I have never removed the product sticker, so, assuming it's still in production and available, perhaps you can still find it if you so desire:

Hopefully I will actually have some down time to do some modeling!

-Joel

Neverness enters the Space Race

+++From the cold ship yards of Fenris, emerges the battle barge 'Ragnar's Breath'. Pictured above on it's first test voyage, not yet fully armed and outfitted with the killing arsenal that will rid the nearby systems of the the xenos scum that pollute them. Hark, for the origin of this majestic war machine is upon you.+++

It's been damn near 10 years since I last played BFG. Warfrog and I spent a solid day playing the heck out this game, and I don't think either of us has messed with it since. However Masta Cheef and his grot underlings have been playing it off and on and bloging away with some impressive paint-jobs, and with my gathering of the Rogue Trader supplements for the RPG, my interest in finally building my fleet has been growing. Recently while shifting my...um....'stock' around, I came across this battle barge in a zip-loc GW UK parts bag. Why I ordered this like this I have no idea, but alas here it was:

Cleaned up, which was to me a far more challenging task then I originally thought (remember this statement, it becomes the theme) I figured I could quickly paint this between business trips.

Here it is base coated in Shadow Grey. This was a pain in the ass, as all the little details were preventing paint from filling the voids. Once I got to a satisfactory point, I wanted to proceed, but the fricking model kept chipping. So, again, satisfied with it at a certain point, I took it outside and blasted it with one of my favorite art tools: Workable Fixative.

The mid coat and highlights went fairly quickly, and here it was just before the final highlight stages and assembly.

And a closer view...

Assembly, again was a pain in the ass that I thought would be far less challenging. Once I got most of it together, I added decals to the...fin things with the yellow circles... and then proceeded to build it most of the way.

Here it is without the turrets and lances -just don't have the time tonight to do them and do this blog. Also I've been itching to play around with photographing this ship against the star field background that I made a few years ago using felt squares, paint and a tooth brush. This is my star field for playing the game on but I works good for photos too I think. With slightly better lighting, I think I can achieve the effect I'm after (my favorite pic is the one that I started this blog entry with)

Once I finish this (adding the guns), and move on to the rest of the fleet, I will take more pics and experiment a bit more with the lighting.

-Joel

Pods to Drop and Lands to Raid (and Speed) part 8

It's been a long time since I was able to focus on some mini painting, but this weekend I made a bit of progress on the Land Speeder Typhoon (that I haven't touched since...late June?) In the pic above you can see where I have touched up the middle coat, and worked on the Aquila emblem on the front as well as the shoulder pads of the crew.

This pic is a focus on the gunner. The chest Aquila gave me a real challenge. Ideally I would like to paint these models in a disassembled state prior to building them, but the necessities of having a field able army that doesn't look like a pack of cripples sort of gets in the way of this practice. Typically for Space Wolves I base the Aquila on the chest with Fiery Orange, then mid-coat with varying degrees of Sunburst Yellow before topping it off with highlights of Bad Moon Yellow and a dash of Skull white. But, this rarely works as the Bad Moon yellow, it not thick enough, can give off a bizarre greenish cast or worse, run into the grooves. There for a few strategic applications of brown ink helps contrast the grooves, and a muted wash of orange ink will help mute the yellow a bit, before adding few additional highlights of the yellows. I feel this is not very rewarding work however, and since I'm liking the bronze/gold effect on the Aquila on the front of the Speeder (and the Drop Pod -see 1st entry in this series) I'm tempted to try this out on the next Wolf Pack that I paint.

Here are the collected parts of the Typhoon, I finally painted the launchers choosing to make the warheads red (I have made them white on past models, but ultimately feel that the red contrasts better).

As further proof of my old school cred:

When I did the original Land Speeder a few years back I opted to use these decals. Having used the classic 'Ragnar' style decals over the years, I found them to be a source of frustration, especially trying to apply them to the unforgiving curvature of the Space Marine shoulder pads. In an effort to be unique, and to bring my army around full circle, I've decided to use this style for my army's company markings. Also, I feel this mixes well with the newer style, and so my army will contain a mix (sometimes on the same model) of these emblems.

...and here they are, applied to the two crew members, Also note that the Landspeeder Typhoon now has it's final highlight of Skull White on the hull and the marines.

Just a few more steps and this will be done!

_Joel