Anniversary Marine Project (Part 3)

And here we are: not-quite-am-Iron Warrior marine is done!

Finished!

Here are the last stages of his progress:

Assembling the arms was a tad tricky as the original left arm I selected wasn't going to work. So I found an alternate and it seems to work a lot better.

Painting the coils on the Plasma Gun took quite a few steps. Essentially I began with a Scab Red base, with Mephiston Red, which I mixed with an old Blood Angels Orange, with a highlight of Sunburst Yellow. I washed over this with a red ink glaze.

Shoulder pads!

The shoulder pads were finished after I put the Iron Warrior's decal on. I hope Adam doesn't mind that, i think they have one of few icons that could be used pre and post Heresy, but I could be wrong. Anyway, it was bitch to get it on and I had to apply many layers of Micro Set to make it work. But once I did, it was time to glue the whole thing together. And here he is completed:

Completed!

Completed from the rear.

Back in anniversary-marine-project-part-1 I shared Adam's thoughts on how he would like the base done up. I think I did a pretty good job with getting all good and swampy with the colors, but I had left a few areas of the base exposed, which I colored, and these applied lots of gloss varnish to make it appear like a small pool or a puddle. I then added some grass tufts for a bit more a marshy feel. After I sealed the model outside with matte varnish, I decided a photo in natural light would be a neat idea. I positioned him on some dried mud (is a "dry creek" that runs next to my house) and I thought he looked right in this environment. 

Defender of the mucky-muck!

So that's a wrap! Thanks everyone for participating and celebrating our birthday over this past month, Also thanks again to our winner Adam for participating and choosing a new challenge for me to paint. I will be sending him to you as soon as I find an appropriate, and secure, box to send him in.

Long in the Fang (Part 4)

Hello. As I write this Warhammer 40,000 is about to enter a new era with it's 8th edition soon to be launched upon the gaming world. It will be the most radical change in the ruleset since the transition from the 2nd to 3rd editions. From everything* I have seen so far, I think I am really going to like these rules and I am excited for their release.

Meanwhile, I have a game lined up soon in which I will play the Space Wolves for the first time in 7th edition. Despite the fact that I consider them one of my Primary armies, I just wasn't excited by their codex and once again realized the way I liked to play them wasn't really supported in the codex, but instead the obvious "new" units were clearly given "win button" favoritism. Which is fair enough I suppose, but at that time I was at a very strained place financially and couldn't invest in adding new units. So the Wolves waited. Oh yes, I almost brought them out when the Warzone: Fenris Campaign kicked off but I just couldn't break away from the Chaos stuff I was having fun with.

Coming soon will be their first, and likely their only, 7th ed game. This awakening can be attributed to multiple influences: Shadow War Armageddon encouraged me to dig out my Space Wolf Scouts, Kushiel has been goading me for many months for a showdown against his Lions, and (as I previously stated) the approaching new edition. Digging them out and looking over my army I find a lot of projects that were half started or mostly complete that I never finished for some reason or other, and I am invigorated to get back to them. Click on the Space Wolves label and you'll see some of them (Rhinos, Whirlwinds, Wolf Guard, Drop Pods, Fenrisian Wolves, etc.)

One of these projects is my Long Fangs project. In Long in the Fang-part-one. I reviewed some of my older Long Fang models and their color schemes. I considered this a completed project at the time but in hindsight I believe I was kidding myself (Also there was no way to foresee the increase in base size up to 32mm). Earlier today I found myself reviewing them for the first time in a long time

Long Fangs assembled.

I am still very pleased with the models I added to this unit a few years ago, but I have been pondering expanding their unit with options that could let me split them off into additional units if I chose to. They are quite versatile and tend to kill more things than a more expensive tank would in their place.

Some of these models, and their paint jobs, are showing their (err, my?) age just a bit. Take this guy:

So old his base dropped off.

This guy was my original Long Fang Squad Leader. He needed to be "wolfed up" at the time so I added a power axe and sculpted on a beard. This was my first ever attempt at using epoxy putty as a sculpting medium. At that time GW wasn't selling it but they were talking about it in White Dwarf, so I sought it out. I found the epoxy putty in the plumbing section of a local hardware store. It did the job, but it wasn't nearly as user friendly as Greenstuff but the real down side is that it seriously stank! Anyway, he turned out OK even if he did end up looking more like a Mennonite leprechaun than a space viking.

If I do restore this model I am unsure if I will keep this head or not. I will still need to fix that axe regardless of whatever I decide to do with him.

Heavy Bolter.

Ah, the classic plastic heavy bolter! This was available in the original Space Dwarves plastic boxed set but I ordered a few from GW mail order back in the day just to get a few additional weapon options. This particular model had a bolt pistol in his left hand but it busted off at some point over the years. He was posed to appear to be firing the pistol while holding the heavy bolter in a rest postion. As the '90s thundered forward GW upped the size of their heavy weapons leaving this weapon to appear strangly small.

Also, the heavy bolter had to be the most reworked weapon design in 40k history.  It last appeared similar to this in the Space Crusade boxed game before settling into today's familar design silhouette during 2nd edition.

Las Cannon.

Although this las cannon also suffers from the original smaller size, the silhouette and design of the weapon still conforms to later designs. I like this particular model as it was one of the first Space Wolf models that I painted that I felt confident about how to paint it. He was definitely a stepping stone on the path my Space Wolf paint style would eventually evole into.

The missile launcher marine above is among the first 10, possibly 5, models that I ever painted. The yellow stripe on the helmet is a bit of a give away in that regard, as that was a common thing to see on early Rogue Trader era marines.

This next guy is among the last I painted in this style. Comparing the two you can see that my technique was cleaner and more confident at this point and I was experimenting more with tones as layers. Despite the fact the the 2nd edition Codex: Space Wolves was the current book at the time I still wasn't quite ready to shift my Wolves over to the heavier "baby blue" look that the models in that book had.

A note on the missiles: even today the typical option for missiles in a game of 40k are Frag and Krak (somes called Super Krak) missiles. I wanted to make this distinction apparent on the models so I made the Krak missiles red with yellow bands and the Frags yellow with red bands. In those days there was whole list of additional missile options, and one of these guys has a green set of missiles to represent that. I think they may have been intended to be Anti-Plant missiles but I don't really recall. We'll just say they're Flakk missiles from now on.

And yes, these are detachable. If you built your Imperial Space Marines correctly, and carefully, it was possible to make the missile launchers removable.  Although one of these loosened up in time and requires a bit of blu-tac to hold it in place.

The point of this is that my oldest models no longer look right with my newer ones. The original Space Wolf scheme is no longer favored at GW and was further retconned out by those heretics who write the FW 30k books (Dark grey -bah, that might as well be Luna Wolves!). I will likely experiment with repainting a few models just to see if I like my current style on them better or whether I should just leave them be. After all, I do have a lot of unassembled and unpainted plastic marines I could just move onto anyway, but these classic RTB01 marines have always appealed to me. Believe it ot not, my original paint jobs were beginners attempts at following the steps in the Space Marine Painting Guide from 1989. Figuring out how to thin my paints was something I did on my own as these paint guides were somewhat lame at explaining how to it.

Step by step painting Space Wolves in '89.

What follows was the original iconography guide, which would be totally ditched 2 years later in the Space Wolf White Dwarf lists of '92. These icons were challenging for the average painter to paint and next to impossible for a beginner to do. Which is why my old Space Wolves almost all have blank shoulder pads.

That is all for this ramble, more wolf stuff will be appearing here in the future.



*Admittedly I am having a tough time accepting the Primaris Marines into my paradigm.

Anniversary Marine Project (Part 2)

And the work progresses....

Adam, winner of our birthday giveaway, stated how he would like the model's base completed in the first part of this series and I wanted to make sure I was making a good effort at it. I started with a darker brown, Folk Art Raw Umber, to give the ground some darker shadows.

Folk Art Raw Umber basecoat on the base.

Then I added the Stirland Mud. First I had to run down to the local hobby store to get it though as I didn't have it yet. It is a texture paint, and it looks like chunky mud or fudge from the Chocolate Fetish that somebody put into a Citadel paint pot, but rest assured, it definitely is a paint. It's a good product and great for basing models and I wish I had it for when I was working on my Bolt Action British infantry.

Midcoat of Stirland Mud texture paint.

Scab Red base on eyes and gem.

After that I dry brushed on the Pallid Wyche Flesh like he said he did, but I though it looked too 'frosted' for my tastes so I washed over it with Sepia Ink. Sepia is weird blend of brown and green and it's just perfect for the swampy look I think Adam was asking for.

Pallid Wyche Flesh drybrused on ground.

Sepia ink wash over ground.

Next I painted the armor using a lot of Nuln Oil over Leadbelcher and Delta Ceramcoat Metallic Pewter. I am pleased with the result.

Armor painted.

Armor washed.

Gold highlights on brass.

During the course of the last few pics, in addition to working on the armor, other details were also painted. The power coils on the plasma gun were painted with Scab Red and then Evil Suns Scarlet; Still some work to be done on those bitz. The brass bitz were finished off with Shinning Gold as was the plasma gun itself.

Space Wolf Scouts (part 1)

Shadow War Armageddon has given me the excuse I needed to finally get my Space Wolf Scout project started. I have been using a set of old metal Scouts with my Wolves for years, but I was never terribly passionate about them. Especially the actual Space Wolf sculpted ones with atrophied and/or flayed looking arms (seriously, how were those ever approved for production?!).

For my Scout Kill Team, I put together 3 plastic Scouts, and with a reluctance to hack up any Scout parts in order to have a Meltagun and a Plasma Gun, I decided to incorporate these two old metal Space Wolf Scouts into my new Kill Team -for now anyway. How their paint jobs turn out will determine their fate. The other metal scouts are going to get bumped over to the Ultra Marines as I feel that they will work better over in that army.

Space Wolf Scout Kill Team.

During the building of the Shadow War Kill Team list I also came up with names for the scouts. From left to right, we have the Scout Sgt Magnus Stormborn, Scout Ulf Blackstone, Scout Rolf Krakentooth, Scout Gunner  Tryggr Thunderclaw, and Scout Gunner Gunnar Murderbreath.

Magnus Stormborn was a fun model to construct. I used the marine arms from a mix of older Space Wolf sprues. I positioned the arms a little bit high on the torso so that the top of the shoulders just passes the top edge. This gives the illusion that they are more like the shoulder pads on the arms of the plastic scouts.

Sgt. Magnus Wolfborn.

Having stated that, I am still tempted to put at least one paldron on him in the spirit of the first Wolf Scout Sergeant I painted back in the '90s.

"I'm not a Space Crusader, I am an Advanced Space Crusader!"

However if I do do that, I think I'll pass on giving him white gloves...

Anniversary Marine Project (Part 1)

The winner of the Neverness Hobby Chronicle birthday-6th year anniversary giveaway, Adam, reached out to accept the reward and inform me on how he would like to have the model completed:

"When I first got into the hobby back in 2010, I bought a box of Black Reach, my friend took the orcs and I took the marines. I picked a black/bronze scheme for them, and slopped some paint on. I was never happy with the results (black is hard to paint!) so I quickly moved onto imperial guard, but I've since picked up some 30k stuff and have been wanting to return to my...preheresy Iron Warrior loyalists? A similar paint scheme done by someone much more talented than myself could be a fantastic reference piece and inspiration."

Adam's original paint scheme from 2010.

So this miniature is going to be inspirational piece? That is pretty cool, but also it ups the game a bit as now I really got to do the best job I can do on this marine, especially if it's going to be the inspirational piece for a whole army!

After some additional correspondence he decided to take a Plasma Gun option with the heating coils painted red. That should be fun, since I have never painted them in any color other than blue.

I immediately started the night I first heard from Adam by picking a base and cutting a slot for the slotta tab.

Slot.

And presto, he was based!

Astartes Erectus.

Adam also gave me some direction on the look he wants for the base:

"I've tried to base my marines with a swamp inspired theme. I've attached an image of a contemptor base I was working on as well as one of my old Black Reach Marines. I found that Stirland Mud with a bit of Pallid Wych Flesh drybrushed onto it gave it the color I liked for the ground."

Sounds easy enougb to me, and the effect does look sufficiently swampy.

Tread'n on swampy ground.

After thinking about it over the course of a week, I figured out how I am going to paint this scheme, which will reveal that in future posts as I progress on the model. In our correspondence Adam requested that I lay off the 'hazard symbols' that seem so common with this Legion, and should be an easy request to fullfill as those things can be time consuming.

Iron Warriors Heresy-era scheme

So having said all that I was able to get started on the model. Gathering and selecting the bits, and assembling the plasma gun arm took me longer than expected, but I'll blame the resident toddler for distracting me. Here I have started the base and primed the model black:

Primed.

 Next I have begun the drilling and pinning for the arms. Neccessary if one hopes to not be reglueing them back on all the time.

Drilling the holes.

Test fitting.

And there you go, the project has offically started!

Celestial Lions Kill Team (Part 7)

Progress continued on the 2 Specialist Marines from Part 5, and they were coming along at a decent rate when something occurred to me...

Basecoats.

I realized that I was short a single standard Tactical Marine needed in order to make a 10 man unit. I found this basic 2nd edition era multi-part plastic marine that I thought would do the trick just fine. Those of you curious of his exact origin, he is from the Space Marines: Warriors of the Imperium boxed set. As that link will reveal, this specific guy was very nearly converted over to chaos!

As found.

I needed him to conform with the others of course so that version of bolter had to go. Also the base had to be upgraded. I do believe that the swap over to a 32mm base simply does wonders for these older models.

Upgraded.

It didn't take too long to get him up to the level that the Specialists were at, and now I am working on all three at the same time.

Caught up to the other two.

I have reached the point where I am about to draw on the Chapter Icons. Seems like a good spot to leave this update for now...

The Shadow War begins...

Harlequins in the Underhive.

Finally we got in a game of Shadow War: Armageddon. Warfrog and I have been itching to play a game together for...well, way too long now, and we finally managed to get our schedules to align. Both of us are veterans of the 2nd edition era of Warhammer 40,000 and the 1st Edition of Necromunda, and Shadow War speaks that same language but with a few subtle variations. So we agreed to give it a shot.


I decided to give my Harlequins a go as they haven't hit a gaming table yet and the equipment they come with (Flip Belts and Holo Shields) gives them a special in game edge in the type of environments we tend to encounter in these Underhive games.  I pulled together a Harlequin Kill Team from the models I have been clowning around with off and on. I was a bit shocked with how quickly the points were exhausted during list building and with some of  the sacrifices I had to make as well. I arrived with a Leader, the Troupe Master,  with a monomoleculer  sword and a shuriken pistol, a Virtuoso with a Neuro Disrupter and a mono sword, a Trouper with a Harlequins Kiss and Shuriken Pistol and a Mime with no additional equipment other than his concealed knife and wicked ability to walk against the wind. -That's just 4 miniatures!

Warfrog had a similar challenge while creating his Tyranid Kill Team and ended up with only 3 models, however they have a total of 12 Wounds to my 5 Wounds. His Leader had q Bonesword and a Lash Whip, a Warrior with Scything Talons and a Devourer and a Weapon Beast with a Venom Cannon. Note that Warfrog's miniatures were not physically armed as he hasn't managed to get that far with his magnetizing project yet, but with the list this small we had no problem remembering these details.

Warfrog brought some of his old Necromunda terrain which we set up into an appropriate underhive themed kill zone. We chose the first mission in the book which is pretty much a straight up fight. I deployed and went first.

The Underhive and Deployment.

Zipping through the Underhive, dashing up ladders, across cat walks while avoiding incoming fire from the Tyranids, the Troupe made it's way into the realm of the 'Nids.

Maneuvering through the Underhive.

The Virtuoso took the first wound off of a Nid  using his Neuro Disruptor only to have it fail it's ammo roll. The Tyranid Leader and the Warrior jumped the Harelquins on the cat walk, and removed the Trouper with the Harelquin Kiss from the game. The Virtuoso and the Troupe Master soon joined the fray and the dance of death began and continued for many rounds.

Warfrog and I had a lot of fun re-engaging with these particular Assault rules. In the Necromunda games we played since 40k 3rd ed came out, the Assault phase was usually over in a round with combatants not being as specialized as our Tyranids and Harlequins in this fight were.

Melee on the catwalk.

Somehow, and in time, the Harequins eventually overcame and defeated the Tyranids, only to find the Weapon Beast, who had been shooting up the Mime while the others where locked in combat, waiting for them with his Venom Cannon primed and pointed in their direction.

"Now Space Elves, you face your final trial!"

The last few rounds of the game were quick and ammusing. The Sustained Fire Dice kept providing the Venom Cannon with many shots, that ment the Harlequins could do nothing but stand up at the end of their turn due to the pinning. Eventually the Troupe Master went Out of Action.

Crawling towards cover.

The Mime eventually rushed over to aid the Virtuoso only to fall victim to the same trap!

Finally, after many rounds of both of us passing Bottle Tests on or just under the number, the Harequins decided they had enough and fled the field.

Anyone familiar with Necromunda, Gorkamorka or Mordheim can attest to the post-battle phase where you determine if anyone gets stat advances, new skills or lingering injuries. Shadow War uses a similar, although stream-lined, system. My Troupe Master ended up with a head wound that resulted in him now having Frenzy. Reading over that rule this maybe more of a benefit for him than a hindrance but we'll see if this Team ever gets a 2nd game. I used my 100 points to buy some extra gear and to get my Troupe Master that Power Sword I wanted him to have from the get-go. Now it's just a matter of seeing if the locals only want to do one-off games or if we're going to allow a loose campaign to happen or not. Time will tell in regards to that, but for now, I can say that Warfrog and I had fun romping around the Underhive again.