Winter Of Discontent

It's spring and my winter hobby freeze is beginning to thaw. Mainly I just had nothing worth blogging or things stalled half way through. 

This is where this fellow stalled. I am not happy with the claw and he needs a 32mm base. I've put him aside for now. 

Next, I began work on an Epic Eldar army, with the all but finished Blood Angels force, I hope to play some Space Marine Second Edition with. 

A company of Falcons and one of Guardians. 

I've pinned the grav-tanks so that they look like they are flying once fixed to bases.

I air brushed on a coat of yellow and then gloss. 

And then gave them a wash of oil paint for that old-school panel line look. This is where these stalled. The first reason is that the oil paint took ages to dry enough before I was confident to lay a matt coat over the top in preparation for doing the details. The second reason is: 

 

The Age Of Sigmar!

Goldie here was the only model that I managed to paint since the last post. 

Age of Sigmar has certainly made one hell of noise in our quiet hobby world. So much hate poured onto the Internet. It's been quite extrodanary and, if I'm honest, quite off putting. On more than one occasion I've thought about going on a long, long online holiday and leaving all the anger and stupidity behind. 

The up shot of this is that AoS fits our little group very well. We've been playing it and enjoying it. After three games  I'm starting to see it as a subtle little game that has given us the freedom to do whatever we want with hobby and models. It's also brought all sorts of half finished projects out of cupboards and sparked many more future plans. All great things in my mind! 

My forces of chaos fighting my dwarfs in our first game. Lesson: synergies are king!

Warriors of Chaos v a loose coalition of Aelfs, Free Men and Stormcast. Lessons: Chaos Chosen are mighty. Synergies are the king of kings.

Warriors of chaos with chaos dwarf allies v Aelfs. Lesson: princes on dragons are crazy good and should be targeted with anything that deals out mortal wounds ASAP. Numbers do eventually show in combat. 

All this gaming led to me putting together the khorne half of the new starter set. It was a few weeks of work during the darkest days of winter. Trulely some fantastic models! 

And since then to this; 

I've made good progress on these evil little bastards and will post some more WIP shots as I go. 

I'm also thinking about re-basing some of my chaos army. Round bases just look better. I don't know why but they do! It'll be a painful job so I'm putting it off. 

That's it. Hopefully spring will be more fruitful hobby-wise than winter! 

The Warhound and the Cult

I've got a couple of projects done since my last post. I've not had the time for much hobby sadly. Real life stuff like getting a new oven installed and an increasingly tiresome job have got in the way.

This has taken up most of that hobby time I've managed to steal. It seemed to take forever to get done. Every time I finished one thing five more loomed. The red and the stripes are air brushed. This sped up the initial colouring but it lead to lots of additional work touching up and pin washing the details. It felt a little arse about with getting the bulk of it done in a couple of nights then spending weeks on small things. 

I was very lucky to get this model. It was one of those right place right time things. I understand not many were made and that it is no longer available. 

It has turned out ok. Though I fear it may lead to a new Epic army using modern style models. White Scars on city fight bases would look great. 

And I've finally got the second two cultists with some support done. 

I'm not sure what stopped me from getting these done. I was overthinking it and they became more difficult in my mind than they needed to be.

I'm really happy with this crazy bug-eyed madman.

With the gun-servitor I really tried to add a thick patina to made it look as if it had been in use for a few thousand years and was no longer in the best condition. I imagine a heretical cult has to make do with whatever it can get its hands on.

All self respecting cults need a subject for their veneration. 

Inspired by this little bit of progress I've raided the bits box and come up with this "blessed" cultist.

Don't know about him, as others have suggested, he may be too much like a He-Man villain. Options and ideas are always welcome.

--Richard

Yaktribe finale

So my entry is finished, with a little time left to spare. 

So I present to you, my entry, The South Sump Syndicate. 

This is the core group, escorting the official member of the syndicate, Mister Verkehr.

Hans Kellin, keeping an eye out for any risk on the horizon. (Or any ganger who looks like he won't be missed)

His blind, yet ever present comrade, Brunhilde. 

Little Smiley, the fun loving, cigar smoking wiseass. 

Our Hero, Verkehr. 

And last, but most definitely least, fresh from the slave blocks of Lone Warren!!!

Grub the "Man" servant. 

I think of grub as something I made for the sake of it, he's a filthy and pointless little thing, but he's willing to kill at the slightest provocation and I like that in a lackey. 

So that's it from me. Let's see how the competition goes!!

More Yaktribe goodness and a red mechanic

A little more work on my Yaktribe entry this week, mainly on Little Smiley the Ogryn and Mr Verkehr of the South Sump Syndicate.

When last you saw these two, they werent accompanied by the gentleman with the rather long rifle, but they had something much like this lack of all things resonably pigment related.

 Little Smiley then got a bit of a going over in the basecoat department, his colours were quite limited and rather plain, showing his lowly station and simple nature.

 Soon enough he got a snazzy hair color and some shading to his clothing, this stage was my favorite.

Here, i think I made a mistake. I personally think I took him too dark. Not 100% sure, but I may strip him and start again.

 Next up is Verkehr. Hes a really plan and unassuming looking bloke, his uniform was really simple and I just wanted something easy to recognise in the masses of the underhive.

The "S" in the cog will be the symbol for the Syndicate.

Started washing him here, he looks a lilittle better with some definition in the face I think.

 And here he is a bit later on, chilling with my new and improved Skitarii maniple leader Metalus Octus.

 There is still a lot of detailing to do on them all, but I think it's a good start so far.

Also, here is another shot of that fellow from earlier with the rather long rifle. and a friend for him.

These will be the final 2 for the protective detail, unless I have a heap of time left before the end of the month and can add some more to the group. He is a FW renegade guardsman torso, some guard bits and a rifle from the beautiful new Skitarii kit. If you don't have at least one box of these yet, GET ONE RIGHT NOW!!!!! There are so many cool bits and pieces in that kit, the heads alone are worth their weight in precious, precious Unobtainium.

So, there's lots more to do, but it's coming along.
THere are already a bunch of awesome entries showing up, so if you haven't checked Yaktribe out yet, GET ON IT!!!

Until next time, keep on keepin on.

YAKTRIBE COMPETITION 7 "HOUSE OF CARDS"

If you haven't ever seen Yaktribe, you're missing out on what I think is the most comprehensive Necromunda resource on the entirety of the world wide webs. It's a great community with a constant stream of new resources and plenty of juicy new minis and project logs.

So I finally decided to get off my butt and enter one of these competitions i am always seeing and the entry requirements are as follows.

Build a group with at least two members of a Noble House, Brats, Servants or a Lord for Necromunda... A Made Ork, who earned his place on the hulk for Gorkamorka... or an equivalent for Mordheim - Mayor, Knight!

Plainly speaking people from The Spire or Royalty, members of a Noble House - a Lord or Lady and his / her servant or counselor. An aristocratic Hunting Party, a Trader and his retinue, something like that. Someone powerful. Something we normally don't see in our games (apart from NPCs) but wish our leaders might become.
Traders and Guilders with their retinue are also great examples.

So I decided that a cool idea is a Necromunda style bike messenger, without the bike.
Now the underhive is a pretty rough place, you know, with the constant risk of being shot in the face, so I think he might need some muscle.

I present to you, the beginnings of my underhive delivery company, The South Sump Syndicate.

Knights Of Old

Three Knights done and ready for the Epic battlefields of the 41st millennium. 

If I'm honest I've never been a great fan of these designs. They come from the age in the mid-nineties of insipid mono-pose plastic models. An age that spawned the dull figures in the second edition box set and whole regiments of single cast skaven or chaos warriors. They did the job but were not that exciting once you'd painted one or two. I should say that I think the "new" 40k scale plastic knight is one of the best designs ever produced by GW. It's good to finally -- after owning them for nearly twenty years-- get these ones done. 

For my next project I've delved very deeply into my hoard and pulled out a classic that will never be bettered in my opinion. 

I'm thinking leopard skin and blue-greens with purple, red and yellow. No pink with black here! No, sir. Just pure 80's heavy metal. Need to hunt up some D-rok on YouTube now. 

Speaking of classics. Here is a model that I painted as a teenager. I saw him in White Dwarf and had to buy him on my next trip to the big smoke. This was before there was a GW in my state. I think that there was only one in the whole country. Ahh, the olden days.

I'm still pretty proud of that paint job.