Túbal Villar is selling some of his painted Dark Angels on Ebay. I thought I’d share his post on the chance someone out there is looking for something along these lines. I think they are well painted and even if you aren’t in the market for some marines, enjoy the pretty pictures. 🙂
Sad to a degree, but needed in the current situation… Both economical and space-wise…
A bit of old and a bit of new… Starting at 50€, it will be my way to measure the market, the interest, and worst case scenario, I could get the same unpainted stuff for more or less the same.
So if anyone is interested, or knows about anyone who might be, needless to say, it would be much appreciated if you share it. It is expected to end in seven days from today.
We started off January with a challenge to showcase the first miniature people painted for January 2021 to start the year off right, painting-wise. We have a nice round up of first fruits of the year. If you click on the gallery pictures, they will lead to larger versions. As usual, if I missed anyone, please let me know and I’ll update the post with your work.
Dave Stone of Wargames Terrain Workshop was first out of the gate just a couple of days into January with his nicely painted space marine librarian sporting the colors of his Night Hawks chapter. Dave’s in-laws gave the model to him as a Christmas gift, which is nice. Better than a tie or some paisley socks, though as I think about it paisley socks sound better and better.
Looks like the mechacherub is no pushover either.
I like the yellow cloth and the freehand black detailing is nice too.
My friend, Daniel, a local, legendary Imperial Guard commander, has been playing a lot of Infinity these days and his first model of the year, according to the official lore “is a member of the Zulu-Cobra unit, a reconnaissance unit that specializes in asymmetrical warfare as well a niche for amphibious and jungle environments.” Daniel likes him because “he’s a very handy sneaky piece that can bring some cool surprises to the table.”
He’s from the PanOceania faction.
I was curious about the radar dish so I asked Daniel about it. He says it is “a jammer” that “can easily harass everything on the board” by shutting down the enemy’s communications and such. I’m told he is a pretty good shot with with a good, old fashioned firearm too.I like his cloak too; the hexagonal pattern is nifty.
Tom Douglass, the owner of Dragon Den Games in Stockton, California, finished his Death Guard Plagueburst Crawler as his first miniature of 2021. Tom says that Death Guard is “so liberating compared to my space marines or even Necrons, just because there’s no ‘wrong answers’ and nothing has to be uniform. Painting Ultramarines, I need to be exact, be sure not to overstep or overdo anything, it’s all very clean and shiny, which is also very satisfying, but in a different way entirely.”
Tom illustrates this Nurgle Ethos with a gap that he noticed while building his crawler: “There was a gap in the back when I was building it, and while I was wondering how I was going to fill it I decided, ‘You know what? how about “it’s broken” and bubbling gook out of the gap?’ Now it’s on purpose.”
I like that about Nurgle-based stuff too. Embrace the imperfections and treat them as enhancements. 🙂
Which rivets are the ones John made to fix up some battle damage suffered casting the model?
John tells us that the Cricket was “armed with a 150mm heavy infantry gun and allocated to the support gun companies of panzergrenadier (mechanized infantry) regiments.” There were various versions built; the one shown here “used the chassis of the Czech LT 38 light tank, this vehicle being built by the Germans as the Panzer 38t” and provided “short range, indirect fire support.”
I like what John did with the camouflage. He details how he achieved this look in his post, so check it out if you are curious.
Nice diorama too.
Mick at Twitchy Bristles comes in with his repainted Eldar Farseer Ry’hil. He reports that his faithful eldar commander had distinguished himself in battle and deserved an upgrade. So into the paint stripper he went and the result below is new Ry’hil, ready to distinguish himself even further for Craftworld Ulthanash Shelwé.
Mick’s Ry’hil specializes in fighting Tyranids.
Mick writes that is much happier with the repainted model, “especially the green colors and how much better the bone colors ‘pop’ on the rest of the model.” Serendipitously, he “also managed not to spill excess varnish on everything this time,” so there’s that too. A fine kettle of spirit stones that would be, spilling varnish all over a war hero!
Mark of Mark A. Morin painted quite a few Aztecs over 2020 and his first completed miniature for 2021 is a Conquistador with a banner. Mark writes that the banner “is a representation of the image of the Blessed Virgin Mary that Hernan Cortes used during the Spanish Conquest.”
I think Mark did a nice job with his bannerman as well as the other members of his command group. Check out the others members of the group on his site. I also liked the dioramas he put together for his Aztecs and I’m glad he did the same for these guys.
Mark is pretty serious about getting his Conquistadors painted — he’s running “Mark’s Conquistador Contest,” (complete with prizes) to motivate himself to paint them. I have to confess when I first saw the contest in my email I didn’t check it out right away, since I don’t have any Conquistadors to paint, but I wish I had before the entry date closed in early January, because it turns out the contest was to guess the date Mark would complete his forces. Lesson learned for next time!
Eric, of Candore Et Labore, graces our painting challenge with his “very old Bretonnian Green Knight,” that he painted after “stripping 99% of the old paint off the miniature, repairing some really bad gaps,” and repainting the miniature with what he’s since learned over the past twenty or so years.
He is certainly a nice study in Green.
Eric doesn’t think he’ll be playing Warhammer Fantasy Battle again, so he opted for a vignette. I think he did a very good job on it. Kind of makes me think that his old knight has been granted an honorable retirement as some sort of Protector of the Lonely Wood.
Maenoferren22, of Bogenwold, also decided to paint a Green Knight, the same miniature in fact that his “good mate Eric,” had already painted. He already had stripped the paint from his knight (I’m seeing a pattern here) along with a bunch of squires and such. Maeno decided to paint up a couple of retainers to accompany his lordship, though he “cannot actually remember which was finished first.” I know what he means. I’ve batch painted a group of miniatures before without really being able to remember which one I stopped working on first.
Steve, of Dreadaxe Games, painted an Imperial Guard/Astra Militarum Sergeant for his 2nd Infanty Squad as his first miniature completed for 2021. He opted to equip this model with a laspistol and chainsword “due to the fact that I ran out of bolters!” Steve also did a head swap from the Sisters Repentia kit for that “grizzled veteran appearance.”
It looks to me from the scars that the Sarge has both seen a lot of action and is hard to kill.
Steve is “currently batch-painting the 2nd squad in 2 chunks of 5.” He’s been painting these troops in a “fairly straightforward” way and “keeping the palette to a minimum,” which he’s been having fun with. I can see that. Although not fancy, the color scheme is effective and I think what one might expect to see for a typical field uniform. After all, not all of the Imperial Guard can march into battle looking like they just stepped out of the Napoleonic Wars or wearing giant, mutant bearskins. 🙂
Matt, “a Welsh bloke living in Vermont” at pmpainting, offers us a Reaper miniatures flashback to the 1970’s, Horace “Action” Jackson. Matt wrote that he “did [his] usual job of procrastinating over what colours to paint him,” and ended up looking to Google for his inspiration, settling on the pink pants pictured below (with just a hint of ’70’s flare).
I like Matt’s choice of colors for the clothing and agree with him that Horace is very suitable for inclusion in a collection of “zombie survivor” miniatures.
Continuing with the zombie survivor theme, Azazel, of Azazel’s Bitz Box, brings us “Old Betsy,” from the 10th Anniversary Edition of Last Night on Earth. I very much like the job he did on the weathering, including some bullet holes and a nifty, cracked windshield.
Kind of reminds me of an old (albeit red) truck that was moldering in my grandparents’ field when I was a child.
Azazel reports that he’s used “Old Betsy” in a number of different games, including “the entire campaign of” Zombicide’s Night of the Living Dead, where the truck stood in for the “cardboard car chit in almost all of the scenarios.” I agree with Azazel that the truck “can also work in any modern game, other zombie games and also quite a few post-apoc ones as well.”
Joe, of JoeSavesTheDay, brings us his Raptors chapter terminator hero, Brother Feurranator, with an assault cannon. I like the green color scheme and in a way it reminds me a little of Green Army Men.
Originally, Joe went with the gray basing in the pictures below but remembered that his “Raptors are all based in a reddish Martian wasteland setting,” even though it messed up his brass ammo casings. Perhaps he’ll put them back in at some point — that’s his hope.
Dave, of The Imperfect Modeller, painted “Alain,” a 28mm cavalier produced by Reaper. I agree with Dave that there was “quite a lot going on and a fair bit of detail” with the figure. He said that he kept “base work simple,” and I think it all came together nicely.
Note the freehand cross on the small shield device.
One of the commenters in Dave’s post mentioned that he was “surprised by the black shield on the back,” figuring it would be the same color as the device on the front. I was similarly surprised and think that the black shield was a very nice choice, both in terms of the “surprise” and also because with everything going on with the miniature having a solid bit of black and red was pleasing to my eye.
More nice freehand on the shield.
David, from Scent of a Gamer, brings us a welcome touch of Nurgle with his Corrupted Alchomite Stack that as you can see has been taken over by a trio of sickly, yellow nurglings. The base is “old packing material” and David “scatttered some bits of the sprue around as bits of twisted metal and broken railings,” which I thought was a nice idea.
The green piping suggests the stack is thoroughly blessed with the gift of Sacred Rot.
Cute yellow nurglings. I like how they stand out.
Nice trail of green slime. 🙂
Kuribo, of Kuribo’s Painting, is enjoying Fallout from Modiphius Entertainment and his first completed miniature for 2021 is this Super Mutant Master. A solid plan — paint what you enjoy and are playing. I thought Kuribo had an interesting take on doing the flesh. It looks to me like it sort of could be mutant, desert camouflage. Perhaps the Mutant Master applied it himself but more likely, I think, it is a lucky mutation that gives him a better chance of closing the distance and whacking someone with his hammer before he gets filled with lead or arrows or whatever.
Given how big this guy is compared to an average person, that is one big sledge hammer he’s brandishing.
This guy is a “leader/elite model” that “is going to hit in melee close to 90% of the time.” Sounds like if you are see him coming at your forces, you’d better try to soften him up a bit before he gets in your face if you can, unless you have someone on your side who is similarly brutal or maybe is a master of defense!
The last entry for the painting challenge is that same puissant Chaos Lord who began the last challenge I sponsored back in 2020 — Wudugast of Convert or Die. He’s been painting forces for Warcry and his first miniature for this year is this Kairic Acolyte.
These fellows are “the human followers of Tzeentch, petty sorcerors and schemers who make up the rank and file of the cult.” This miniature, as Wudugast relates, comes from the Warhammer Quest: Silver Tower board game. I mostly know Wudugast for his excellent Nurgle and generally dystopian offerings, but it is good to see him turning his attention to some of the other Chaos gods as well.
Thank you very much to everyone who participated in the painting challenge. It is a fun, varied palette of work and I enjoyed putting this post together. I am toying with the idea of doing a Macabre March painting challenge where the idea is to paint some miniature that unequivocally qualifies as being horrifying, ghastly, gruesome, etc.
I didn’t get anything finished myself painting-wise for January, though I did make good progress on Frank’s Pig Demon’s clothes and I made a start on a friend’s dragon gnome for Dave Stone’s Paint What You Got and Alex’s Femburary challenges, both of which conclude at the end of this month.
My husband and I like to play Parcheesi off and on as a quick, low commitment way to get a little gaming in when the mood strikes us. It often works out for some reason that my dice tend to fall so I have late game zergs where I roll a lot of doubles and hence get to cover a lot of ground quickly with my pawns. I often play the green pieces and when this strangely ubiquitous phenomenon begins I have taken to “Declaring the Waaagh!”*
This gave me a spur of the moment idea: why not use our long-neglected Warhammer 40K pieces to play Parcheesi?**
I decided upon a tetrad of bloodletters, including one with a horn and of course their Banner of Hate probably constructed from the flayed skins of their victims. My husband used four of his Ultramarines he painted some years ago. The fact he had a missile launcher made me a little nervous but at least it wasn’t a flamer or that scary Assault on Black Reach captain!
The Ultramarines took an early game lead by getting two marines into the home square as you can see below.*** However, the forces of Khorne had some rather Tzeentch-like tricks up their sleeves where they posted themselves on the blue safety squares in an attempt to take the skull of the unfortunate banner sergeant.****
The Ultramarine banner sergeant turned out to be tricky as space marines in general that chapter in particular are known for. Thanks to some well executed maneuvers and dice tricks he was able to avoid my blue square snares and post himself with his colleague in a protective blockade. Unfortunately for the bad guys, my tricky Tzeentchian-Khornate bloodletters had a very strong position with a blue square blockade of their own with one of their fellows (top left corner) waiting to pounce.*****
I’m sad to report that despite everything, my daemonic blockading plans fell flat and both marines were able to escape past my red home row unmolested. (Note the position of both marines in the picture below relative to the picture above.) My daemons have to move up into the home row toward the home square so anything past that is safe territory for the Imperium.
It is a tight game. Two marines are already in the home square but the balance of my forces are a bit closer to home. Still, I’d say at this point it is a small advantage to my husband’s squad.
In the end I had my usual late game zerg but then so did the Ultramarines. Happily, the Khornate good guys won but it was a close thing: the last marine was in his home row only two squares from victory. So the game was almost as near a thing to a draw as you can get in Parcheesi.
The marines failed to close the warp portal before a massive incursion of Khorne goodness vomits into real space. The imperial fall back plan of Exterminatus fails when their bombs are possessed by daemons. Their primitive machine spirits become existentially enraged so the bombs immediately launch themselves toward the nearest highly populated worlds. Perhaps in a future game of Parcheesi 40K we’ll see if the space marine fleet can catch both the daemons and their own rogue bombs in time!
* I wish I could claim credit for thinking this up but it was my husband who first mentioned it, harkening back to our old 5th edition 40K games of marines versus space orks that always seemed to end somehow in my guys moving absurdly quickly all at once, overrunning his forces in a painful but mercifully short episode of buckets of dice being rolled and sanguine massacre. Actually it didn’t happen all the time: I think my husband forgets all of the times where his guys shot half my army off the table by turn two but hey I’m probably biased.
** The older 25mm bases worked well for doing this. I don’t think the newer 32mm bases would have done the trick because they are too big for the squares.
*** Sweet, sweet victory is achieved by getting all four of your pieces into the home square before your opponent does. Given the You Go/I Go nature of the game, a tie is not possible though I do remember a game I played as a child where my opponent got mad and flipped the board and tried to declare it a draw. She wasn’t the nicest of losers and sometimes used the same pernicious tactic in Candyland.
**** The blue squares are “safety zones” where pieces are safe from capture by the enemy. On the white squares, you may capture an enemy piece by rolling a number that allows you to end your move on the opponent’s square, sending him back to his home circle. Skulls for the Parcheesi Throne!
***** A blockade is formed by having two of your own pieces on a square. Neither your own nor the enemy’s pawns can move through a blockade. A blue square blockade is stronger still, because when you move a piece, breaking the blockade, your other piece is not vulnerable to attack. It is a common tactic to try and capture an opponent’s pawn by denying it the ability to move by means of a blockade, and use another piece behind to threaten a capture.
My thoughts turned (as they often do, especially when I’m buying another box of undead or demons or something) to the fact that most of us already have a box or closet or garage full of unpainted plastic and wouldn’t it be nice to chip away at that mountain, even if only symbolically? Thus the Paint the Crap You Already Own! painting challenge was born.
We have twenty-two artists, who contributed pictures of their work, this time around. As you will see, this post is quite long. So I decided to split the round-up into two parts.
If you click on the various pictures and such, many of them will take you to the painter’s website. Click on the galleries to see larger versions of the pictures. (As usual there are a few Easter Eggs here and there.) Thank you to everyone who participated and I will get the second part out just as soon as I can.
Who better to place in the vanguard of this month’s offerings than a squad of Mcmattilaminis’ nicely painted space marine scouts with shotguns led by the sergeant with a big fist?
I like the basing skulls, particularly the orkish one.
Mcmattilaminis reports that he did quite a bit of work modifying these guys. He used Scion heads, which I agree look good on these guys. I also appreciate his nod to tradition in having the sergeant eschew wearing (or even carrying) a helmet.
I thought the backpacks were a nice touch too and added a lot both from an aesthetic and gaming standpoint. (These also came from the Scion box.) They look good and if you use these scouts in a game they can pay the points and have camo cloaks or if you’d rather not, well, they’re rolled up and stowed.
Nice job on the camo cloaks.
Mcmattilamini also presents three orks, which seem like they’d make suitable enemies for our scouts. I like the weather and armor chipping and the orange is pretty. Plenty colorful too. The freehand work on the helmets and shoulder pads and the little “evil sun” on the boy’z shoulder pad on the right are all nice touches.
I like how he uniforms aren’t identical …
… but still appear unified along the same theme.
Mikeland82 from Starship Vorenuswrites that “from 28th Feb through to the end of June I would buy no new minis, and focus on the backlog.” In other words he’s going to paint the crap he already owns. Good man! He made excellent progress for May as the gallery below illustrates. (You can also see some larger pictures of these models by clicking on the gallery or still larger yet on the round-up post in his blog.)
Stoessi’s Heroes: German Commander
Necromunda Bounty Hunter by Mikeland82.
Copplestone Casting: Gangsters street thugs
Warlord Games/Conquest Miniatures: Last of the Mohicans
More Last of the Mohicans
My personal favorites are the Last of the Mohicans figures. I remember these miniatures from a Muskets & Tomahawks game I played at a convention some years ago. I also like how Mike based them so they are carefully advancing through the tall grass. The brown roots evoke memories of wetlands for me because I’ve hiked and hunted many times through exactly this kind of thing back in my ancestral stomping grounds of New England. Never met any Mohicans but I’d occasionally meet a Penobscot.
Turning toward the gigantic now, we have Lordcommandereloth’s, of Eloths Endeavours, mighty “Stick Man” with a giant sword that his wife bought him for their 5th wedding anniversary. As he reports, this is most appropriate since this the wooden anniversary. Good thinking indeed on both their parts!
A lot of interesting stuff going on with this highly impressive centerpiece ent.
I think LMC did a brilliant job. I particularly like the bark and all the many details, such as the red shelf mushrooms, the sword and staff, the leaf loincloth and of course the base. L.C. Eloth says that he did the bark by basing with a cream color, washing with dark brown and then dry brushing progressively lighter colors ending with white. Smashing. Did I say that I liked the bark yet because I really do?
“For the Forest!”
Note the differently colored eyes.
Mushrooms!
In addition to all of this arboreal goodness, I found some interesting work-in-progress posts as well:
Next up is that rather prolific painter, Azazel of Azazel’s Bitz Box, with, well, lots of different things. Imagine, for a moment, that you have been challenged to play a game with whatever figures you can paint in 30 days. The game is Mishmash 40,000 where your force is more effective and you unlock key capabilities by putting together something like what we have below.
I respectfully submit, Gentle Reader, that this is a power gamer’s list for Mishmash 40K!
If you would like to know more about these miniatures, I’ve included a list of Azazel’s individual posts. Something I find interesting about reading his site is that he enjoys working on older pieces and one gets to see some unlikely and obscure items from the past on his blog. From more or less left to right (more or less) from the above image:
As Azazel pointed out, a few things he painted didn’t make it into the above group picture. He painted two of the “industrial pallets” from the Battlefield Accessories Set, of which I only see one. His Slaaneshi Champion, from 1988, who has been sitting neglected for maybe 20 years never made it into the picture and neither did a respectably large collection of cages and chains. I don’t know if it is just me, but do you think perhaps there might be some sort of dark prince-based connection here?
I definitely could come up with some interesting house rules for this terrain.
Twenty years and now a fully painted Slave to Darkness!
“Reiksguard Knighrts, your Emperor is calling!”
We turn now from ancient miniatures cast during the mists of time and left sitting on desks throughout dark antiquities to a painter, who is making her debut on the pages of this blog, and exhibits her art using the non de plume of The Little Elf. Her work can be primarily found at Double Down Dice, where she is assisted by Faust.
My Little Pony by Faust’s Little Elf!
I like Little Elf’s choice of colors for Her Little Pony. One wonders what the pony’s name is and what magical powers our equine friend exhibits?
Faust’s offering is another Blood Bowl entry, well, sort of. He is planning to use the prosperous fellow below as a “dwarf coach” for his team, though I agree with Faust that Coach could also “do double duty as a merchant, noble, etc. for other games.” Whatever the case, surrounded as he is by all of those chests of treasure, Blood Bowl seems to be treating him well. What more could any dwarf want?
Faust said that the gold bands on the chest are lighter in the picture than in person.
Speaking of the chests, Faust reports that he used Contrast paints for the wood, “which was nice and quick.” He used Army Painter Light Tone shade for the metal parts. I liked how the wood turned out and the word “quick” got my attention as it always does, so I asked him in the comments what he used for paints.
Faust wrote that he used Gore-Grunta Fur Contrast for the open chest, Wyldwood Contrast for the darkest one, and Aggaros Dunes Contrast for the lightest chest. “Washes were only used sparingly towards the base on most of the chests.”
Thanks, Faust, I’m definitely going to give this a try on my two Etsy chests!
Glad the painting challenge helped you get this guy done! I like the cloak.
Next up we have The Introverted Hermit, who some of you might know as (among other things) the Monday Maker of Mandalas. This month she completed some interesting (and useful speaking from someone who plays D&D with a grid map) bases and bunch of “miniatures I’ve had shoved in drawers for months.” Sounds like an ideal project for the “Paint the Crap You Already Own” challenge!
Here we have our Stone Golem friend, who made its debut in the advertisment for the upcoming May Miniatures of Magnitude challenge. I would say from the expression on its face, some treasure robber is going to have a bad day.
Love the mean, glaring expression.
As for the treasure this lithic chap is guarding, I.H. helpfully supplied some treasure bases, including this one and some more in the gallery …
I think my 3rd level Fighter could retire with all of this loot.
… and being ever-helpful, there are also some bases of bones, entrails, and such in the gallery just in case things go awry for any plunderers of ancient wizards’ towers.
Two Mind Flayers
Bat Swarm
Gnoll with Big Axe
Bugbear!
Two Bases of Entrails
Bandit with Crossbow
Two Bases of Bones
Hero Forge Miniature: “Odin”
Troll by The Introverted Hermit.
Bandit with dagger
Treasure and Rocky Bases
More treasure
TIH’s Painting Area
Last and not least, just in case our adventurers don’t run afoul of bandits, gnolls, bugbears, mind flayers, bat swarms, and trolls, plus make it past the stone golem, there is this Mummy Captain and/or Lord as a suitable end boss. In addition to dual-wielding a couple of khopesh-looking blades, the good captain/lord may also have defenses and powers formed from the dreams/nightmares of the intrepid DM!
“Join me in death, vile mortals!”
Continuing down the black road of eldritch magicks, undeath, darkness and perhaps even “vile mortals,” we have another Reaper offering from Dave at The Imperfect Modeller — the aptly named Marise Greyshroud (and friends).
One wonders what the writing on the sword says.
I must say that Dave has been doing a good job of marketing for Reaper between their fun miniatures and his great painting skills. Last month his wizard caused me (or perhaps ensorcelled me, who knows?) to go over the their website, make an account, and put a bunch of their miniatures onto my nascent wish list.
Besides being nicely painted, Queen Greyshroud (or perhaps Greenshroud?) would certainly make a meet sovereign for some wraiths I started assembling. Yet more grist for the mill of my Reaper wish list?
I think it is best, before I hand the good folks at Reaper all my credit cards, to perhaps plane shift over to the more solid ground of Napoleon and the 19th Century, courtesy of Marvin at Suburban Militarism. For April, he undertook the fairly ambitious project of completing these 28 figures representative of Napoleon’s Old Guard.
Marvin says that he liked how the miniatures had interesting “facial features which seem to give each pose character.” He goes on to opine: “Perhaps my favourite is this fella below who seems to be casting a quizzical glance askew.” (He is speaking of the soldier in the largest image on the right in the gallery below.) I wonder if the grizzled veteran can’t help but think of all that has happened over his years of service and wonder how it all could have come to this?
The Officer
One of Marvin’s favorite soldiers.
Pioneer Sergeant
Eyes Right!
Attention!
The “this” I’m referring to is of course Napoleon’s farewell address before he leaves for his exile to the Isle of Elba in 1814. Marvin has put down some sand and arrayed his Old Guard into a hollow square in front of his 18th Century country house that has also seen duty as an ersatz palace.
“Soldiers of my Old Guard, after 20 years I have come to say goodbye!”
Here we have Napoleon Bonaparte. The figure below also comes with the Strelets kit, which I think is a nice touch. Marvin, as a painting guide, “settled on some portraits of him wearing a grey overcoat and the uniform of a colonel of the Chasseurs a Cheval,” and including “a silver medal with a red ribbon” he often wore.
L’Empereur Himself!
All quite well done, I’d say, but Marvin wasn’t done yet. No, not by a long shot. He decided to make a Youtube video, “Napoleon leaves for Elba”. This link will take you directly to the video, where you can leave Marvin a like if you wish.
You can also access the video from his page or see a non-video pictorial transcript of the farewell. Marvin was kind enough to allow me to post the video here as well.
We say farewell (or bon voyage perhaps?) now to Napoleon and hoof it west, hop a boat, hoof it west some more and finally hop into our moves-temporally-while-staying-in-the-same-place time machine from France to the Aztec Empire.
Mark Morin recently purchased a bunch of miniatures that were from the ’70s to the ’90’s, including a bunch of Badger Games Aztecs. He originally didn’t have a “fully developed concept” for them, but then he “volunteered to write a supplement covering the Spanish Conquest of the Americas in the 16th Century,” and thus he had a reason to paint up his miniatures. Let’s begin things with Mark’s novice warriors.
I’m sure what the novices lack in experience they more than make up for their enthusiasm.
Mark reports that “a major aspect of warfare of this period was the overriding need to take captives.” A novice could advance to veteran status by taking suitable prisoners. (You can read more about what he has to say on the subject here.)
Red-themed novices.
Blue-themed novices
Pair of slingers
These two look like them mean business.
Next up are the veteran eagle warriors. These guys and the novices represent the beginning of what Mark hopes will someday be an impressive force of 150 painted models. I like how colorful these Aztecs are, so I agree that many warriors would look very nice on the tabletop.
Veterans on the run brandishing their tepoztopilli (spears).
Veteran Eagle Warrior by Mark Morin.
I fondly remember the days of lead miniatures so it comes as no surprise to me that Mark wrote that the spears were “spaghetti-like” and “vulnerable to bending.” I liked his solution, which was to put a thin layer of Apoxie Sculpt on the weapons, which made them less bendy. That is a great idea that I’m going to remember. Mark details the process he used here if you are interested. I’m looking forward to seeing what the future brings for his 150 warrior horde.
Tarmor of Dragons of Lancasm, who is “married with four chickens,” completed five Reaper miniatures this month. He hasn’t been painting as much because he’s getting ready to play Shadowrun, but five is “more painting than I’ve achieved any other month this year!” so it sounds good to me. Heck, I would count five as a darned good month in my household so well done, Tarmor!
I like Mal’s glowing, green eyes.
The miniatures represent, from left to right, “Reaper 03893 “Mal” Catfolk Warrior, SW76 Mon Calamari, SW26 Bossk (trandoshan bounty hunter), SW77 Engineer, & SW27 Weequay.”
Looks like the Star Wars contingent isn’t getting along very well at the moment!
He plans on using the Reaper Catfolk Warrior as “one of the player characters” in his D20 Gamma World game. The other Star Wars figures were produced by West End Games/Grenadier as part of boxed sets in 1988-89, and he purchased them back then.
Glad to see you were able to get some of those vintage figures you’ve had sitting around painted up!
Obliterators are used to endings (or ending peoples’ lives, rather!) so I think a pair of these guys are a good place to close out part one of our round-up. The Word Bearers are strong over at Dreadaxe Games as is evidenced by first a helbrute and now this fanatically gruesome (or gruesomely fanatical?) pair offered up for our spiritual edification and enslavement.
Dreadaxe achieved his obliterators’ “mad pink” flesh by base coating with Rakarth Flesh, which he washed with Carroburg Crimson. He “added Cruchii Violet to the recesses and some of the more bulbous areas of the skin for a bruised, infected look.”
On that happy note so ends Part One of the April 2020 “Paint the Crap You Already Own!” challenge. Part Two will be about as long as this offering and I will publish it as soon as I can. I hope you have enjoyed our little journey through space, time, and the imagination. So we won’t say goodbye quite yet to our painting challenge but instead au revoir!
Time for another painting challenge! This time the idea is to paint at least one model that represents a creature, machine or terrain piece that is on the larger side. Aircraft, daemon engines, tanks, giants, trains, cavewomen riding mammoths, ships, and beasts that are great, writhing masses of tentacles, eyes, and maws that tumbled down from the stars or crawled up out of the sewer all will find a home in this challenge.
(Note that if you click on the pictures, they will take you to the artists’ websites. I’ve included some examples below of projects that would work for this challenge.)
Part of “Clean Oceans” mural on Mission Street in Santa Cruz, California
Rules of the Challenge
The challenge closes on July 3rd, 2020 at midnight (last place on Earth). The project must be completed, but if you can’t get your pictures posted by that date, it is fine. Just post them as soon as you can.
Models must represent a creature at least the size of an ogre or small giant. Machines must represent something that is at least as large as a medium-sized armored vehicle or single-seat aircraft.
Terrain pieces and dioramas are also welcome. (See examples below.)
Any scale is welcome. The miniatures can be small but have to represent things that would be large at 1:1 scale. Also, there is nothing to say it has to be a miniature. If you want to paint a mural, put a coat of paint on your house, refinish a good-sized piece of furniture, those would all count too as long as it is a painting or staining project.
Projects can be works in progress at the start of the challenge or you can begin something new.
You can complete one model or as many as you want. Basing is great, but is optional.
Questions, comments, ideas? Let me know in the comments.
If you paint small models during the challenge that would strongly fit thematically with your larger miniature, you can include them in a group shot. For example, if Azazel painted an APC, like the one pictured below, and also painted some suitable space marine passengers to go along with it, he could include the marines in the group shot.
Rhino APC and space marine rides by Azazel of Azazel’s Bitz Box.
Dioramas are also welcome for the challenge. In these cases the whole is greater than the sum of its parts so you are not required to include a large creature or dominating terrain feature, although you may. Pat included a good-sized wall in his “Desert Attack,” but the diorama would have qualified for the challenge without the wall because there is plenty going on here without it!
“Desert Attack” by the eponymous Pat of Pat’s 1:72 Military Diorama’s
A single building will qualify for this painting challenge. Dave built a Wells Fargo Way Station as part of of diorama, but the building alone would qualify too. As you can see, he went to the effort to model the inside as well. (Click on the image to see the outside of his building and the overall diorama.)
Inside of Wells Fargo Way Station by Dave at The Imperfect Modeller.
Wudugast’s rat-ogre and its slightly smaller friend would both qualify for the challenge. If he painted the ratman, with the spiked club and shield, on the far right during the challenge, it would fit thematically with the others and he could include it in a group shot (like the one below) if he wanted.
Wudugast’s “rat-ogre” (left) and friends from Convert or Die.
Aircraft, like this representation from WWI by John, could fly into the challenge. Any sizable machine or vehicle from any historical period as well as from milieus that only exist in the imagination are fair game.
Miniatures that represent towering statues or impressive golems that might guard forgotten ruins or await orders from a dread magician are appropriate …
Stone Golem by The Introverted Hermit
… as are mighty warriors (reptilian and otherwise) riding fearsome dinosaurs!
Scar Veteran riding a repurposed Allosaurus by Maenoferren22 of Bogenwald.
Trolls can come in many shapes and sizes and fortunately a lot of them can stand eye to eye with an ogre. Some have interesting professions and hobbies too, such as playing in death sports, football leagues, or both at the same time.
As for me, I hope to finally finish a pig demon-looking thing that a friend asked me to paint for him so long ago now that he apparently forgot I still had the miniature. Heck, I forgot about the pig demon too until I happened to find it when I was organizing my hobby room/office. So this challenge will push me to put pig demon toward the top of my painting queue and get it back into my friend’s hands before the end of the Aquarian Age!
With then still WIP poxwalker #18 to demonstrate scale.
The pig demon is my first priority, but maybe I can squeeze in Becky the Bloat Drone here too. If so, my post-Heresy Death Guard forces will wax mighty indeed comprising this daemon engine and a full 20 zombie squad (hopefully) of poxwalkers. Let the galaxy tremble!
After this painting challenge ends, I’m going to take July off from running painting challenges. Azazel has written that he might be doing a Jewel in July challenge for 2020 and if he does I’ll be painting for that.
Frantic reports of daemonic incursions emanate from the agricultural hinterlands of the ninth planet in the Ben Lomond system. Elements of the Dark Angels space marine chapter investigate and find several warp rifts to Khorne apparently opened by means of the ritualistic sacrifice of entire villages. There is nothing left when they arrive but death, red mist, blood and horror. Astra Militarum forces, garrisoning the planet, are air lifted to support the quickly beleaguered marines. This is one of many desperate actions.
Imperial armored forces cautiously take up positions surrounding the warp rift.
Captain L. Danielus and I played the Warp Rift scenario. This time we used the Superior Reconnaissance special rule. As things turned out, we both agreed this balanced the scenario nicely for a shooting versus assault army and made for an enjoyable game.
The Khornate forces were a Slaughter Cult formation within a Bloodhost Detachment. In addition to my usual host of uglies, there was quite a lot of small arms potential this time with three squads of extremely angry daemonkin space marines (not Angry Marines though). The backbone of the imperial forces was mechanized Guard veterans, assisted by nicely painted Dark Angels tactical marines and terminators led by a chaplain. An eversor assassin rounded out the loyalist forces. Our good captain as usual led a Combined Arms Detachment into the fray.
It isn’t too active now, but soon deamons will come screaming from the living stone!
The early stages of the fight didn’t look too promising for the Imperium. A squad of possessed space marines clamored out of their rhino and up three floors inside a ruin where a Dark Angels devastator squad had taken up excellent firing positions. Say what you want about possessed, but they are as agile as spider monkeys! Predictably, after a sharp, gruesome fight, the possessed were in possession of the ruin and the devastators were but a gruesome memory.
Also, a mob of bloodletters erupted out the rift and made straight for Captain Danielus’ massed line of chimerae. Despite focusing almost all of their considerable firepower on that single group, apparently the daemons were strong with the might of Khorne, for when the red mist settled the remaining daemons, reduced in number but still hissing and howling scuttled onward with their black swords held high.
Dark Angel devastators take aim.
Still, the company commander and his men never give up, and of course Dark Angels know no fear (or if they do they are pretty good at hiding it, at least in front of a chaplain), so they stood fast, determined to close the rift or at least sell their lives as dearly as possible. Not that they would appreciate the sentiment, but they earned a grim salute from your Sanguine Narrator. Blessings to the Strong!
Only through heroic sacrifice and much blood spilled, mostly on the imperial side, were the loyalist forces able to hold the field. Their grip was tenacious but weakening by the second. As the rift energies peaked, shining like a coruscating red giant, disaster was at hand. A towering bloodthirster strode out of the midst roaring with laughter. He was unpainted but mighty nonetheless.
The few remaining veteran guardsmen were in no position to help. They had their hands full with a particularly frisky chaos spawn. It seemed to have become stimulated while in proximity to one of the glistening stone menhir, which needed to be seized if the gate was to be closed.
Death Wing terminators teleport in to challenge the deamonkin terminators.
Everything pointed to a complete victory for the daemonkin. In the end the mighty daemon prince stood alone controlling one objective. He was busy cavorting over a grease spot that used to be an eversor assassin. A vendetta gunship interrupted its dogfight with a heldrake and hovered over another objective. To pick what what survivors they could, perhaps?
The plucky guardsmen almost broke against the chaos spawn, as it ate several more of their number. The tentacled monstrosity seemed impervious to chainsword, krak missile, and that king of weapons, the lasgun. Fortunately the spawn was so busy vibrating it didn’t notice a single guardsmen, who wasn’t taking part in the fight. He placed his hands on the menhir and mumble an incantation. The soldier exploded in a bloody mess but the red mist around the stone abruptly vanished.
Finally, the Dark Angel chaplain and his men advanced toward their objecrtive in the face of harrowing Daemonkin marine bolter fire. Despite being almost under the bloodthirster’s gray hooves, the giant paid no heed to the angels in his exultation.
Waiting for the perfect moment to strike.
“For the Emperor and Mankind!” the chaplain screamed as he slammed his crozius arcanum against the stone objective. It exploded like a malevolent volcano. Marines were thrown back in all directions. The chaplain and a couple of men came to a few moments later. The rift and all trace of the daemonkin were gone.
So it was a 3-1 win for the Imperium. The warp rift was closed and a great swath of civilization saved. Huzzah for the loyalist’s Objective Secured! Without that special rule the game would have ended in an unsatisfying 1-1 tie.
The Blood God was pleased because, as I told (in an appropriately mock serious tone) one skeptical onlooker who innocently wandered over between rounds of Magic, “Khorne cares not from whence the blood flows, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera!”
Let Hate and a halfway decent set of abs be our armor!
Still, the architect of this appalling heresy remains unaccounted for. Who knows where he will strike next?
I painted some terminators a couple of years ago now. They were re-purposed Assault on Black Reach models I inherited, and then I magnetized the arms that weren’t already cemented on. So right in time for our last game I finished a magnetized Power Tentacle arm!
I did the crux terminatus on the shoulder pad a little differently this time too. When I first painted them I conceived that these guys were sort of “no nonsense” and went for a basic color scheme. So their armor is mechanicus standard gray with a black ink wash with the crux being the old charadon granite color. Looks ok, I guess, when you look at it three inches from your eyeball but on the table, when one is playing, it blends in too much and the whole model seems like maybe they are taking their spartan aesthetics just a bit too far.
So for the power tentacle pad I used fenris blue, drowned it in black ink, then relayered with blue. Highlighted with a bit of lothern blue and then a touch of white. I thought this might be a bit more noticeable and add a bit of color and interest while preserving my original ideas. I probably won’t bother to go back and redo the old guys, but going forward I think I like the new crux much better.
Our first game was piratical marines using a blizzard to launch a surprise attack on IG in a ruined village.
This is a narrative scenario where one side attempts to achieve surprise by attacking an entrenched opponent in the aftermath of a storm. Players should cooperate with terrain or have a third party set up the board. The defender’s table half should contain a village, industrial works, supply depot, trench works, or some other such theme. The attack’s side should probably contain less terrain, though this depends upon how the list match up. Perhaps they are attacking out of sand dunes or from the edge of a jungle.
Of course one can vary terrain density depending upon the army and list match-ups to make for a fair game. For example, a terminator force lining up against defenders who are light on AP 2 weapons may not require any cover at all, whereas a force of light infantry against say a typical Tau list probably should not be forced to walk across a bare board.
Use “Dawn of War” deployment where each player sets up within 12″ of his long table edge. The attacking player automatically sets up and takes the first turn, though the defender may attempt to seize the initiative. Night Fighting takes place automatically on turn one without a die roll. Secondary objective changes are noted below in the victory conditions. The game ends as per the normal rules.
Six objectives are placed in the defending player’s half of the table. We found it best to set up the objectives collaboratively. This resulted in a more thematic placement and also because it can be difficult to legally set up six objectives on one side of the board if both players aren’t cooperating.
The storm could just as easily involve sand rather than snow.
Infiltration and Scout Moves work as normal but there is no deep striking allowed by either side in this scenario, unless both players agree to it. Thus units such as drop pods, which are required to enter play via deep strike, may be limited in number or even completely disallowed.
The attacker’s outflanking units must be positioned so the entire unit, including transports, are entirely within the owning player’s deployment zone on the turn the unit arrives. (This also applies to units with unusual special rules such as ork kommandos with Snikrot.) The defender may not outflank units. Other reserves for both players are allowed but they enter play from each player’s long table edge.
Victory Conditions
Players score 3 victory points for each objective they control at the end of the game. Secondary objectives are as normal except Line Breaker. If the attacking player has more units completely within the defender’s deployment zone than the defender at game’s end, then the attacker receives one point for Line Breaker. If the defender has more units then he receives 1 VP. If a tie then neither player gets a point. The defender cannot receive points by ending the game in the attacker’s deployment zone.
Alternately, you could play this scenario using the Maelstrom of War missions with the tactical cards, but if you do then I would remove the prohibition against deep striking, and also ignore the scenario restrictions for outflanking. Otherwise the attacking player may find himself not able to score any cards until turn three at best! If I did want to play a maelstrom scenario without deep striking, I’d probably use “Tactical Escalation” where the cards each player receives and can hold increases with each passing turn.
Our “They Came Out of the Storm” Games
Space Wolves vs. IG (1500 Points, August 2015): A bloody game with the marines walking out of a blizzard in order to attack IG positions in a shattered village. The defenders successfully held until turn five, but Legion VI-XIII was able to turn the battle around with a healthy dose of luck and several well-timed curses laid by a random shield maiden who wandered by to watch our game.
After completing my goal of 1000 points of Space Wolves before the end of 2014, I’ve drastically slowed down but not stopped adding to the army. My goal now is to eventually get to 1500 points without having to use my husband’s Ultramarines as stand-in’s.
The latest addition is an assault marine pictured above between two of his friends, who I completed awhile ago now. I got a good deal on a couple of boxes of figures because I bought them right before the new ones came out as part of updating the Space Marine codex. My latest assault marine has seen a few battles now as a Wolf Guard Battle Leader, though once I get the rest of the box done he will probably find himself among the Skyclaws.
As usual I painted his power armor with Mechanicus Standard Grey, followed by a heavy wash of Badab Black, then a dry brush of Administratum Grey. When I first started my Space Wolves I tried highlighting their armor, but didn’t like how clean and polished they ended up looking. I wanted a sort of no frills, “rougher” look without doing a bunch of environmental effects like sand or mud. I found that simply dry brushing the armor gave me the effect I was looking for.
So once I finish up the Skyclaws, I’ll have to decide which of the four projects I want to work on next. I have a vindicator that has been sitting around half finished for a very long time now. Alternately, a Stormwolf might be a worthy addition to my forces, adding some needed air support and especially anti-air. Third, I’d eventually like a Void Claw formation because I usually field a lot of terminators who arrive by deep strike. I’ve been using the aegis line with a comm relay and want another option for keeping my reserve rolls reliable. Especially one my opponent can’t potentially use as well. So I’ll need to paint and magnetize a bunch of lightning claw arms to go on my existing terminators.
Lastly, my liaison officer has been calling on our friends the Ultramarines for devastator help for long enough now. It is high it is time to load honors and accolades upon my husband’s loyal, blue friends and send them in glory back to Ultramar and paint some long fangs to take the place of these puissant worthies.
I’ve been working on HQ’s for my Space Wolves lately, and the latest addition to my collection is this rune priest. I’ve actually had him sitting around for a couple of years, but finally decided to paint him. My original idea, after all, was to base my marines primarily around models I already owned. Especially ones that have been sitting neglected for a long time.
I took the jump pack from a Space Marine battle force. I did magnetize it because sometimes he’ll probably want to accompany a drop pod landing or maybe even ride to battle in a rhino, rather than getting stuck with the usual fate of rune priests — casting buffs on thunderwolf cavalry.
I lost the original, normal power armor backpack that came with the model so it was the Space Marine battle force to the rescue again. That piece is still in my painting queue though, since I’ve been having fun running him exclusively with the jump pack.
I like the plasma pistol. It adds a bit of color to a model that is mostly darker, earth tones. I do have to say as a weapon it is situational at best and hilariously bad at worst. I should have used a tiny magnet since it attaches at the wrist. I’ll probably do that when he has an accident and his hand falls off, or gets gnawed off again by some particularly vicious fire warrior.
Thinking about plasma pistols and having fun with how often they blow up during games has gotten me thinking about Space Wolf sagas. There is a designer’s note in the previous codex which states:
Sagas are intended to encourage players to develop some seriously cool names and stories for their Space Wolves characters. You’ll find that after a few games your heroes become a lot more interesting as they accrue personal histories of victory and (dare we say it?) defeat. In effect, your characters will be adding to their own sagas with every new game, which can be great fun.
I’ve been playing this guy for a few games now and we’ve had some laughs over his various and often unsound (game mechanics-wise) antics. So I’ve been thinking of starting a section on my blog for the “sagas” of some of my characters, and I think I’ll start with this guy, his addiction to the dangers and thrills of gratuitously discharging his plasma pistol as well as his hatred of being put on “thunderwolf detail.”
Space Wolves vs. IG (1500 Points, August 2015): A bloody game with the marines walking out of a blizzard in order to attack IG positions in a shattered village. The defenders successfully held until turn five, but Legion VI-XIII was able to turn the battle around with a healthy dose of luck and several well-timed curses laid by a random shield maiden who wandered by to watch our game.
Ann's Immaterium 