2nd City Warzone

Storm Of Vengeance, Devastator Squad Heman

2011-12-16T11:29:00.006-06:00

Hey all, this squad got done alot earlier than expected cause work has been a bit slow this week, so was able to squeeze in a bit more time than I normally could. I also felt as if my highlights are fairly decent on these guys as they were brand new right off the sprue where as my other Dark Angel figures have been recycled several times. I also used instamold again to make a shoulder icon (and save some $$$$)

This stuff is truly amazing and so fast!!! I highly recommend it to anyone wanting to do simple model upgrades.. it does get a bit harder the more complex molds you try to make, but trial and error i feel is a good thing.
So without further ado, here we go...

Here is Brother Sergeant Heman (not to be confused with He Man!) and a lowly unnamed Heavy Bolter squadmate...

more (unnamed) Heavy Weapon Specialists...

and finally, here is the rest of the Battle Brothers.

Next up, a LandSpeeder and just ordered another tactical squad and then I am calling it all good. That will bring my point level to 1165 exactly, which i am calling good and hope will be enough!
Any of you other Storm Of Vengeance attendies have blogs where you've showcased you DA's for this event? Would love to see em!
Cheers,
Brose

Preparing for Storm of Vengeance at Adepticon Assault Squad Zaltys

2011-12-12T16:47:00.005-06:00

Personally, i would ask to get transferred out of Squad Zaltys, just cause i can't stand that name ;)
anyhow, next up, Assault Squad Zaltys

really really overcast today, so sorry bout the slightly bad pictures!
In the next week or so I plan to have Devastator Squad Heman complete. 2 Heavy Bolters and 2 Plasma Cannons, a complete 10 man squad.
Thats it for today!

Trudging My Way to Adepticon

2011-12-08T09:31:00.007-06:00

The next 4 months are going to be a very busy time. I need to build something in the range of 8 gaming tables for my Battle for Piscina IV event at Adepticon and I signed up for several events to participate in as well. One of the events I'm preparing for is the "Its How You Use It" Warhammer Fantasy Battle tournament. I chose to bring 1000 points of Tomb Kings because in a pinch I already have that many points painted. However, ideally I'd like to replace most or all of the models I have already painted. Most of my Tomb Kings were painted in the days when the Undead were all in one book and their was no differentiation between Tomb Kings and Vampire Counts. Then, somewhere around 1998 the decision was made to split the two factions. I diligently repainted my bases a sandy tone and pledged allegiance to the court of Khemri. I still have all of my random vampires, zombies, and ghouls with their uniform Goblin Green bases packed away, shunned, and forgotten but the Tomb Kings still get some love from time to time. A year ago I decided to add/drybrush a few more models and repaint their hideous shields painted around 1995 when I was about as adept at free hand painting as a 5 year old. Personally, I'm not much for drybrushing models. The technique has its place and its my roots but like 8 years ago I tried my hand at painting a skeleton meticulously - not just drybrushing it. That model has sat unfinished in foam carrying cases for the better part of the last decade waiting to be fully risen into the world. Over the last week I experimented with shield painting, redid his spear shaft, and based him with a higher contrast landscape. I'm really happy with the end result.

Above is a Skeleton Warrior most likely painted around 1995. He was painted with Brown Wash over a Skull White Primer basecoat and then dry brushed Bubonic Brown, Bleached Bone, and highlighted around the eyes with Skull White mixed with Bleached Bone. His base was changed to a Bestial Brown top with dry brushing of Vomit Brown and Bleached Bone, and the edge was painted with several coats of Vomit Brown. That was my "desert look". The shield was repainted last year to try and emulate the how I envisioned the shields on the cover of the original Tomb Kings book if there wasn't the ever present orange haze.

This is the meticulously highlighted Skeleton Warrior I started painting like 8 years ago. Similar to the original skeleton he began with Brown Ink over a Skull White Primer base coat. The model was then painted Bleached Bone in successive thin layers to build up a solid coat while leaving the Brown Ink in the recesses. Highlights of Bleached Bone mixed with Skull White, and then pure Skull White were put on again in successive thin layers. The spear shaft is Red Gore with the texture highlighted with Blood Red. Its fairly subtle. The gold accents began as a base coat of Tin Bitz and then was highlighted with Shining Gold and then Shining Gold mixed with Mithril Silver. The shield face itself began as a solid coat of Bleached Bone. Then the edges of the metal, the bottom edge, and the gouges got thin washes of Devlan Mud. Thin watery streaks of Bleached Bone were used to blend the Devlan Mud into the base tone. Then Skull White was painted on in thin watery streaks building up a solid tone and blending the darker lower area of the shield into the brighter top half of the shield. It was a lot of work the first time out but now I think it'll go really fast in the future. Finally hieroglyphics were added using Chaos Black at the very end. The base is Scorched Brown with dry brushed highlights of Shadow Grey, Iyanden Dark Sun, and Bleached Bone. The edge is Scorched Brown.

This adds one more model to my total model count for the year. Also, this week I received a Necrosphynx/War Sphinx in the mail. I still haven't committed to which it will be. The points are roughly the same. Anyone have any feelings on one vs the other?

If Ya Want Sumfin' Done... Part 1

2011-12-01T08:46:00.007-06:00

The Purging of Kadillus by Gav Thorpe skips over the opening engagements between the forces of Ghazghkull Thraka and the combined resistance of the Piscina Free Militia and the 3rd Company of the Dark Angels. At the end of the Prologue, Tauno is on watch and sees a dust cloud approaching Kadillus Harbour and after readjusting his magnoculars multiple times discovers that there are endless columns of Orks approaching on foot. He then promptly drops his magnoculars like a chump. The book picks up with the 1st chapter being The Tale of Boreas: Dark Cathedral. This is a great snapshot of what is referred to as "Ghazghkull's War" in the original Storm of Vengeance campaign pack from 1997, but it skips over the whole opening engagement.

SoV (Storm of Vengeance) also ignores much of that initial onslaught but it does kick things off with If Ya Want Sumfin' Done, a scenario where Ghazghkull lays claim to a coveted objective that the Imperial forces do not understand the significance of at the time. A small elite force of Orks led by Ghazghkull himself breaks away from the main assault on the city to seize a small geothermal plant inside the northeastern end of Kadillus Harbour. Master Chaplain Uriel and Lexicanum Charon move in to intercept the Ork forces but fail to hold the power plant.

This is a really important battle because it helps to set the tone: we are being overwhelmed. One of the exciting things I'll be doing with the Battle for Kadillus event is to flesh out that initial invasion of Kadillus Harbour and the bloody city fight that is alluded to but remains largely undocumented in either SoV or PoK (The Purging of Kadillus). Ghazghkull's forces surged into Kadillus Harbour and then dug themselves in once they had been cut off from reinforcements. The 3rd Company of Dark Angels and the Piscina Free Militia were unable to root them out initially, and the Orks had laid claim to key objectives like the Dark Angels Basilica, the city's orbital defenses, and of course, the geothermal plant. Though we will see tables with all of these key objectives assembled between now and April 19th, 2012, this week I began work on the table for If Ya Want Sumfin' Done...

My starting point begins with this scenario map out of SoV. As you can see it is a 4'x4' gaming area with a couple of diagonal city blocks and a couple of horizontal city blocks with the geothermal plant centrally located on the western edge, if that makes sense. Now one of my pet peeves with GW's representation of cities is that you have a bunch of free standing buildings scattered all over the place and they don't form blocks. A couple of years ago I began work on my own city table that utilized giant movement trays for the buildings themselves so that I could swap buildings in and out and so that I could set up my table in blocks. I've elected to use the same construction ideas of this table.

One of my major concerns when laying everything out is ensuring that all of the city blocks are spaced far enough apart to allow for "real" traffic but to be tight enough to block lines of sight. I decided that the ideal width between most buildings would be 2 Rhinos wide - enough space for 2 normal sized vehicles to pass each other.

Now the idea of a square movement tray to set up blocks is fairly easy to understand. You cut a bunch of squares and rectangles and put your scenery on them. In my case every base is 12" wide no matter how long it is, and it has a 1" border of sidewalk all the way around. This means that if I build scenery pieces that are 10" wide I can drop them onto my movement trays at a whim. The problem I ran into was that when setting up a table with diagonal city blocks my squares and rectangles would be hanging off the table edges; which is both unsightly and prone to people getting caught on the scenery and knocking it around. To deal with the issue I cut a variety of city block sections that are half squares or half rectangles with a 45 degree diagonal edge.

The sidewalks, as mentioned, are 1" wide. I cut them from standard foamcore and glue them down with white glue.

You will notice that I left a square gap. Scattered throughout my city blocks are 1"x1" gaps. I have left those behind so that I can put in street signs, overhead lights, or whatever other details I want that can be swapped in and out.

Just like other miniatures I put every building on a pink or blue foam insulation base. These vary in thicknesses based upon what I am doing. This allows me to incorporate basements or craters into the buildings I build and it allows me to swap scenery pieces in and out of a base as often as I like.

Here the pink foam base is cut and set inside one of my diagonal trays. You'll notice that I've cut card into 1"x1" squares and glued them down on my foamcore sidewalks to create the effect of sidewalk squares. You'll also notice that some of them have cracks or that there is an incomplete section. This is because I try to waste nothing if I can, so off cuts will eventually just become battle damaged sidewalk/curb.

Here I had an already assembled GW city building that Matt Weeks donated to my table construction efforts. Like the sidewalk there are cardstock tiles cut and glued inside and outside the scenery piece to add to the level of detail. These sorts of details will only be added to and accentuated as the process of building the table continues.

Finally here is the culmination of several hours work. All of my diagonal hard board bases are cut. I've started test fitting various pieces of scenery that have already been assembled and painted for previous projects and at least half of the table's bases for its city blocks are accounted for. Now begins the hard work of constructing and painting the buildings. These will be largely intact as its made very clear throughout SoV that damage to the geothermal plants could cause catastrophic mass destruction.

More next week.

Preparing for Storm of Vengeance at Adepticon

2011-11-29T13:24:00.004-06:00

Hey all, been a while since i've done any real modeling lately and its time to change that!!!! I signed up for Nicks 'Storm of Vengeance' campaign at adepticon this coming year and choose Chaplain Boreas as my commander. Decided to re-read the Purging of Kadillus to make my army list as close to the 'fluff' as possible. Starting with the chapter 'The tale o Boreas' I now submit my progress so far.
Here is Chaplain Boreas...

Here is tactical squad Peliel, lead by brother sergeant Peliel.

In the next couple weeks, will have devastator squad Herman and Assault squad.. xxx... haven't read about any assault squads yet.. but had 10 DA assault from adpeticon a few years ago.
Thats it.
Cheers

What Are You Doing At Adepticon 2012?

2011-11-11T17:48:00.004-06:00

My first Adepticon was in 2005. I was living in Washington, DC and my friend Anton from Chicago who had just gotten into 40K found out about this 40K convention and wanted me to fly out for it. I looked over the event schedule and ended up signing up for all 3 of the big 40K events – the Gladiator Tournament, the Team Tournament, and the 40K Championships. I remember the stress of trying to prepare for the Team Tournament and having two of my teammates flake on me last minute and the frustration of having to find 2 substitutes to fill in for us the weekend of. It was a whirlwind weekend of gaming… Way too much gaming! In the years that followed I dropped the Gladiator Tournament, then I eventually dropped Team Tournament, and last year I didn’t even do the 40K Championships. I came to Adepticon exclusively to shop.

This year I am taking a whole new approach to Adepticon and eschewing 40K overkill for a mix of seminars and events. This is my game plan for this year:

Thursday night I will be attending the Introduction to Mold Making and Casting seminar. Over the years I’ve made countless pieces of scenery and a few of them I would have loved to have reproduced. Additionally, the idea of making molds of custom pieces I build to make even cooler pieces seems way too cool to pass up. This could turn out to be a whole separate hobby I have within the hobby or I could hate it, but it’s something I’d like to know how to do so I’m really excited for this seminar.

Friday evening I will be joining in one the Warhammer Fantasy ‘It’s How You Use It Tournament’. At this exact moment this is the event I’m most excited for. I haven’t played the 8^th Edition of WFB nor did I play the 7^th Edition. It feels almost like I’m starting over fresh. I bought the Tomb Kings book this week and as I’m looking at some of universal special rules I realized I have never heard of some of them and have absolutely no idea what they do. You would think this would be frustrating but I’m not a hardened WFB player so it’s actually kind of fun and exciting. It feels fresh and fun. Hopefully people participating in this event are as relaxed about it as I am. Another nice thing about this event is that I already have 1500-2000 points of Tomb Kings painted from 5^th/6^th Edition when they first split the Undead into “wet” and “dry” armies as they were termed at the time. If at any point I find I don’t have time to complete my 1000 point army list I’ve just written up, I can always fall back on what I have.

Saturday morning I’ve given myself the opportunity to sleep in a little. I probably won’t but the option is there. At noon I will be taking a class on Painting Weathering Techniques. I think I do fairly well at weathering but my techniques are pretty rudimentary and some of the things people do now are really evocative and dynamic so I’d like to see what I can glean from this class.

Saturday evening will be fun. I was considering signing up for the Combat Patrol Tournament and though I was still on the fence while I was picking events I discovered via Facebook that some of my friends were also signing up for Combat Patrol on Saturday night. That sealed the deal for me. All 5 previous Adepticons that I’ve played in 40K events I always brought my Angels of Absolution and my Redemptors of Gholinar Imperial Guard force. Never have I brought my Orks because they are my smallest army. Well this year, the Orks are coming with and getting some game time. I’m worried that I’ll regret that choice when things come down to the wire and I don’t have a good selection of models painted but I can’t worry too much about that. It’ll be fun to throw down with something different and maybe get some games in against my friends.

Sunday though is the big day for me and will be the subject of a column in and of itself. This will be my first time running an event at Adepticon. The Battle for Piscina IV is my adaption of the Storm of Vengeance campaign pack fused with the Purging of Kadillus novel by Gav Thorpe. Over half of the slots have already sold out and we haven’t even put up the rules yet which is both exciting and terrifying. I’ll talk more about that later though.

What are you doing at this year’s Adepticon?

PS. Sorry for all of the recycled photos.

Catering to More Relaxed and Narrative-based Players

2011-11-03T08:00:00.000-05:00

There has been a lot of talk about narrative vs tournament gaming recently in blog-land and though nothing has or even can be "resolved", I've been trying to come up with ways to make tournaments more fun for casual players and for narrative events in a convention type setting to be more involving and that really push the limits of our hobby skills. These are some of the ideas I've had over the last year.

Handicapping Codexes

This is an idea I haven't put much thought into the nuts and bolts mechanics of it, but since so many people are collating data these days on the major tournaments it seems like it would be feasible to rank the codexes themselves and implement a handicap system similar to in bowling. The idea being that if we perceived each codex as our team mate, and some team mates perform better than others, we can rate the quality of our team mate (i.e codex) and give a marginal benefit to those who willingly bring a weaker codex to the tournament. By giving good players a bonus for going into a tournament with an inferior codex it might increase diversity. Sure, it might just expand the pool of net lists as people scramble to exploit every advantage, but you might see some of those top rung competitive players taking a chance on a weaker codex rather than selecting the power codex of the week. It'd have to be fleshed out and it wouldn't take into account the nuances of different builds but I think the idea has merit. If in 2009 I hadn't born witness to 5 tables in a row at Adepticon where every player was playing leaf blowers except me I might have actually played in one of the tournaments at Adepticon 2010.

Variant Tournaments

I've mentioned before in a previous article that the most fun I've ever had at a tournament was playing in a Cities of Death tournament several years back in Kenosha, WI (KWars: The Consuming Darkness run by Equinox). I liked how using a variant rule set turned things upside down. Suddenly the 3rd Edition Ork Codex was viable again and no one had all of their tricks and strategies all worked out. This tournament also sticks out in my mind because it had a narrative that linked each battle to the last and the scenarios were all really unique with random elements - the sort of thing the hardened tournament player often dislikes unfortunately.

All the way back in 2nd Edition I ran a tournament at a gaming store in Buffalo, NY that used the Arid Terrain Rules written by J. Michael Tisdel (Citadel Journal 16). Some people were irritated that they weren't well versed in the unique rules and had a hard time with how little cover was used, but the games I played in 2nd Edition using those rules were some of the most memorable games I played. I actually revamped these rules for the current edition but have yet to give them a whirl. Variations like these can really refresh a stale gaming environment in my opinion.

I would love to play in tournament that used alternate FOC's, used Attacker/Defender scenarios, or that used other restrictions, sidebars, or unique special rules. Some would argue that these types of alterations tamper with 40K, the tournament dynamic, and army balance making things too unpredictable. I think they make them more interesting and force you to adapt to a host of environments and tactical challenges. To each their own I guess but its these sorts of changes that really keep you on your toes.

The Narrative "Play"/Historical Re-enactment

After Adepticon 2010 I realized that since I wasn't happy with the tournament events taking place and the environment they created, I needed to step up and start running events that correspond with what I would like to play in. Originally I was going to just run a tournament akin to what I described above. I had worked out a lot of the ideas in my head and thought I had a winner of an idea, but it was still just another tournament to have its restrictions exploited for the sole purpose of victory. I decided to look into what types of narrative events other conventions like WargamesCon were doing, but it seemed like they were basically just huge Apocalypse games that featured any hodge podge of armies. I wanted something with more depth and attention to detail.

There are close to 1000 40K players who will converge in Chicagoland for Adepticon, maybe with an event of that size its possible to re-enact an entire campaign in a day and do it in the most lavish way possible? No proxy armies, no counts as stand ins, and no competition - at least not in the traditional sense. What if we ran a campaign and treated it much like a play where each person has a named character and their forces to control; where each person tries to emulate the story in the most spectacular way possible with their best painting and conversion work to most accurately capture the most minute details? Would that appeal to others the same way that it appeals to me? This is often too difficult to pull off in a game store or at a small convention in grand scale, but the sheer size of Adepticon could make it possible and with enough interest could really put a spotlight on a different aspect of our hobby that stays in our houses or appears on Dave Taylor's blog. (He has done fantastic work capturing the forces of the Gaunt's Ghosts books if you've never looked there.)

I pitched this idea to Matt Weeks, one of the Adepticon organizers and I'm going to try and pull it off this year with a well known and recently resurrected tale. I've spent the last month dissecting the 2nd Edition Storm of Vengeance campaign pack and The Purging of Kadillus by Gav Thorpe to find the best way to break up the scenarios and characters so that participants can select a role and spend the next 5 months painting and converting 750 points of models to represent the Dark Angels, Piscina Free Militia, Goffs, or Bad Moon Orks that took part in this classic conflict. The details still need to be worked out but rewards will be given for painting, accurate detail, and spirit. Each person would play 4 games of various sizes and pairings utilizing adaptions of the original scenarios as well as others developed from other areas of the novel and color text from the original campaign. This is all assuming people respond to this sort of uncharacteristic event. Hopefully there are enough people interested in re-enacting this conflict, because if it goes well I'd love to try and flesh out other novels and classic conflicts to really challenge people's hobby abilities (as well as my own!) and really promote narrative play.

I think all of these ideas have merit but its really up to everyone who wants to see something different let your organizers of your regional events know what sorts of things you'd like to see or volunteer to run something yourself that embodies the kind of gaming experiences you crave.

On a final note: This post breaks our personal record for the most posts in a single year of blogging. Way back in January I set the goal for 50 this year t0 clearly crush our previous 46. This is post number 47. Congrats to us!

Upgrading My Angels

2011-10-11T17:31:00.010-05:00

It would be hard to tell from the blog, but I've been putting a lot of time into my Angels of Absolution the last month. I've been painting on an almost daily basis but not all of it has been about completing models. I've been in the process of upgrading the models I have to be more visually interesting and to better represent how they are organized. One of the things I have felt in recent years is that my models are too clean and pristine. They needed some mud, scratches, and battle damage. Additionally, bases have come a long way since I started this army in 1994 when all bases were Goblin Green with either Green Flock or a layer of sand painted Goblin Green and drybrushed with either Rotting Flesh or Sunburst Yellow. Oof. What a mundane look that was? Over time we've branched out into new colors, textures, flocking materials, water effects, and now even elaborate resin cast bases. Needless to say, though newly painted models can be granted these luxuries, they just won't match the old bases unless everyone gets some upgrading to link them together.

One of the 1st orders of business this month has been the abolishment of the 7th Squad Tactical Squad of the 5th company. You see, when I created the 7th Squad over 10 years ago I didn't understand the organization of the Dark Angels well enough to pick up on the fact that the 7th Squad of the 5th company wouldn't be a Tactical squad, they would be an Assault squad. This

has been a huge black mark on my army for the last 10 years that I had been meaning to erase. Today I'm going to go explain briefly how I erased that stain.

The above model details the offensive 7th Tactical squad marking.

Here I have taken Bleached Bone and thinned it down to a watery consistency so that I can cover the black in multiple successive layers without globbing up my model.

After 2 coats.

And here it is completely erased on the 4th coat. I didn't bother to stage by stage it, but I did the exact same process with Mechrite Red until I had a pristine Tactical symbol to work with. Then I went in with watered down Chaos Black and painted new numbers onto a handful of these 7th squad rejects. Here is the end result.

You might also notice that he has mud splatter and chips in his armor added. His base got upgraded with broom bristle, gravel, and taller static grass tufts.

All of my Angels of Absolution are named. This Meltagunner is Trojin.

Gravis was another 7th squad member. I still love the rivet mohawk I gave him years ago.

Folin was also a 7th squad member. He has a black knee pad with script to indicate that he is a Chaplain Apprenta.

Many campaigns ago Holgin was actually Veteran Sergeant Midas of the 5th Squad. One of his original arms was removed and attached to a different model and his name was changed and his rank lost. If you look closely you can tell he's an older model because his Bleached Bone is not as opaque as later models.

Crace was pictured last post. Unlike the others he wasn't reassigned to 2nd Squad, he was painted specifically to complete the Combat Squad.

One final note. On Saturday night I sat down to paint and discovered my Fine Detail Brush was past its days. It couldn't hold enough paint to reasonably coat an elbow pad on a marine. Completely bummed because my girlfriend had the laptop we've been sharing with her at work and unable to make an emergency order, I sat down to spend a full evening of cutting Space Marine bitz off of sprues. Sunday morning I ordered my new brush and some other supplies including the new Liquid Green Stuff. Hopefully my package will arrive tomorrow afternoon. Today was all basing and photography because I was crippled without that damned brush. Its funny how important our hobbies can be to our daily lives, but they are. Thanks for reading.

-Nick

Fine Cast Death Guard...

2011-10-11T12:27:00.004-05:00

Hey all, bought some Fine Cast Death Guard a while ago from GW and when I opened my box I noticed that alot of the miniatures had defects.. arms completely fragged up, faces with large bubbles on em, etc...
Wasn't completely upset as they are Papa Nurgles little boys, but still called GW and had them send replacements, in the past they've always just sent a new box/model when there were defects, this time though, they specifically asked which ones on the sprue were messed up and only sent those. I was totally fine with that... Going through my box of Chaos bit though and was able to make an almost complete new squad... and here they are

Thats it for today...
Cheers

AdMech Rough Rider test model

2011-10-04T16:14:00.007-05:00

Hey all,
Just recently picked up 5 of these little fella's from MicroArt Studios and thought they might look pretty good as a AdMech Rough Rider conversion. So here is a couple picts of my first attempt..

when i first started painting this guy up, i was like... wait a second, this model is bit different than the pictures posted on their website... sure enough i sent em an email pointing out the differences and they said.. yes, they had problems with the cast had to change it and apologized for not updating the picture, i noticed today that their picture is still the same... hmmmm... ps.. a added the chainsword and bolt pistol...
The other thing i tried to add was the Mechanicus symbol. I used the instant mold stuff to grab the icon from a landraider.. gotta say, that i will have to do try that one again, was hard to tell how bad looking it was til i started painting it up... Next one!

any how, here are some more...

Over all i would give this model a 8 out of 10 for creativeness, i think maybe a 6.5 out of 10 for the actual model it self, there are casting anomalies in quite a few spots.. missing pipes and cables with chunks missing out of them and the biggest was the fenders missing compared to the photo's online, really liked the hazard line painting online... oh well, its all good i think. Really have put this out there too, been posting on forums asking how people use their Rough Riders and so far, no one has said they actually use them anymore, as they only get to use the lance on the charge and only 1 attack base... kinda weak, but i will still paint up the rest and maybe try em out at some point, figure they could be a good last minute objective contest'r. The other thing i've been trying to find, is a good sort of Mechanicus type hunting lance i could use for the count as... any suggestion folks?
Cheers,
Brose

AdMech Guardsman Marbo

2011-10-03T12:53:00.009-05:00

Hey all, Just got this Bounty Hunter Model off ebay and thought it would make a nice count as AdMech Guardsman Marbo.

I know the rest of my army is base coated red, but wanted to try some simple greys to help make him stand out and also to fit a bit more with the fluff and hiding in the shadows. Really excited to try him out in a game, pretty much a one hit wonder i've heard, but sometimes, those can be pretty fun and really mess with peoples plans!!!
Cheers,
Brose
*edit.. just noticed that i didn't paint the handle of his knife...woops

Emptying the Case: Two More Marines Done.

2011-09-29T15:27:00.002-05:00

Over a year ago I got it in my head that I wanted to try and avoid starting too many brand new projects. I have carrying cases full of partially completed models. For the longest time my Angels of Absolution carrying case was full of partially completed marines - Angels of Absolution and a handful of Black Templars. Anyway, the idea I had a year or so ago was to work on the models already started in an effort to clear out these cases. It didn't matter if the model was outdated or obsolete - just find a reason to finish it and get it done. These 2 models are part of that plan. Five years ago I cleaned up some of the early 90's marine plastics with the goal to blend them in with the new plastics by swapping parts around.

Now you wouldn't realize this, but clearing these two models out of the case actually means that I cleared several slots. I painted everything piecemeal so the torsos and legs were in separate slots, as were the arms and backpacks. Not the most efficient system by standards of time or space, but it makes keeping my lines straight a lot easier.
This model is from the 2nd Tactical Squad of the 5th Company. Up until last week I never had a "2nd" Tactical Squad for my 5th Company, but I started reorganizing my squads and felt that it was in my best interest to start one. I'll picture the whole squad next chance I get. The twigs you see sticking out of all my bases now are made from broom bristles.
This model doesn't have the same updated look that the first one has. I used old arms and the less dynamic legs creating a less dynamic model - funny how that works out. He is from the 4th Tactical Squad of the 6th Company. This is also a new squad born out of my reorganization of my squads.
This is a close up of my first attempt at tarnished metal and it came out pretty well. He will eventually have his name added to that plaque.
I've just started adding mud splatter to the legs of my infantry. I'm eventually going to do dirt on all of my models. I still haven't perfected my technique but I get better with each model,

2 more points for Nick. Thanks for reading!

Daboyz GT primer

2011-09-14T20:50:00.002-05:00

I played in Daboyz GT primer this last Saturday. My buddy bill and I went to Daboyz GT last year. I went undefeated the first day and then my first game day 2 was againgst Greg Sparks, the winner of the GT and member of team USA for the ETC. This year they have a better comp matrix than last year. it can be viewed here http://daboyzgt.com/40k.aspx I wanted to go into the tourny with the least amount of negatives for comp and as many high armour value vehicles as possible. my blood angel list was:

Reclusiarch+ Sanguinary Priest(goes in crusader with assault squad)
10 Assault marines with thunder hammer and 2 melta guns in a Land Raider Crusader with extra armour and a multi melta
10 Assault Marines with twin lightning claws and 2 flamers in a Land Raider with extra armour and multi melta
10 tactical marines with melta gun, combi melta and lascannon in a twin lascannon razorback
Baal Predator with assault cannon and side heavy bolters
Vindicator with siege shield
predator eith autocannon and side lascannons

This list only gave me minus 10 points for have 3 dedicated transports(razorback and 2 Land Raiders)

My first battle was againgst the Aurora Chapter (never played againgst them before so i was a bit excited) his list was
biker captain with stormshield
assault termies in a land raider
3 tactical squads in rhinos
assault squad with flamers
bike squad with meltas an multi melta attack bike
predator with twin lascannon and side lascannons

We played the ear collecting mission. my opponent got the first turn and TOTALLY wiffed with everything. not even a shaken result. I then proceded to rend and destroy the land raider with my twin linked assault cannons on my crusader and shook his predator and blew off the vindicator cannon. The big turn in this game was when my assault squad with reclusiarch charged 1 biker directly away from his assault termies and tanks moved up to keep them from assaulting. this would be a 6 ear turn. my blood angels kept eating and after my opponent rolled 3 ones when his termies got shot with bolters, it was all just a formality. game was random turn length and it went 7. in my turn seven, I completed the tabling.

Game 2 (dwindling resources)againgst space wolves commanded by 13 year old primarch patrick. patrick won smoking boots last year at the GT, but keeps coming back for more and he ended up winning a tourney this spring.

His army
psyker with lightning
wolf lord in termie armour leading termie wolf guard in a land raider
lone wolf
venerable dread with assault cannon
2 units of grey hunters in rhinos
long fangs with lascannons

I got the first turn and I moved up and blew the long fangs off the board and stunned the land raider. I spent the game stunning vehicles and destroying his army piece by piece. turn 3 we both take an objective (of 5) off the board. I take the one closest to the unit of grey hunters left and he then takes off the next closest(?). I'm able to hold off the termies long enough to win 2-0.

Last game againgst a crusading marine list with modified kill points(depending on cost of unit) and table quaters (most kill point in quater takes the quater)

His list(ish)

captain equipted like shrike
assault squad
thunderfire cannon
ironclad dread
dual twin linked autocannon dread(what bill calls the A%$hole dread)
2 tactical squads
10 man scout sniper squad
10 man scout bolter squad
5 man scout with power fist squad
5 man scout squad in storm

Again an opponent that whiffed(after he stole the initiative). This mission had a rule that starting on turn 4 you pick a unit of opponents that comes back.turn 4 I got stuck picking the ironclad(when i was with 12" of board edge with most of my army). and turn 5 it was the thunderfire. he brought back my 5 man tactical combat squad and then my razorback. this was a fun mechanic and it made you really think what to destroy turns 3 - on. I had him on kill points and held 3 table quaters. one was held by a lascannon marine from the combat squad that made like 6 saves and then hid in a tree for 2 turns!

So after 3 rounds I had max points. along with someone with a perfect comp score(no minus'). but since painting was counted, my 16 points made up for the 10 point comp drop, and I came up with the win! I guess that techically makes me the number 1 seed going into the GT next month.

hopefully now that I figured out how to use this blog, I will post again soon, maybe even my sniper couts I got with my winnings.

Peace

Melta-toting Robots and more.....

2011-09-14T14:55:00.013-05:00

Hey all, got few new picts to share.. first though, gotta give props to nick and his latest terminator... pat yerself on the back my friend, that thing is beautiful.. If only i cared enough to step up my painting... Your an inspiration nick!
Alright, back to the planet mars and Legio Crimson Mons... Got a few new robots to add to my AdMech IG army, was browsing ebay a while back and found these lovely Rouge Trader era? IG Robots and just had to buy a few for a melta-toting command squad.
self disclaimer here.. my painting is rough around the edges so to speak... so without further ado...

These guys are actually a bit big (scale-wise) but am going to be using this guy as company commander and his hat? makes him fit in a bit better with em...

and this guy will be one of his body guards..

I then got really really excited about finding more old Robots and stumbled across some Epic 40k Knight Titans and the are about the coolest models around, and scale-wise, fit perfectly with regular IG. Some minor conversions and I got another 3 melta-toting dudes for maybe a platoon command squad.

Found these guys on ebay awhile ago too, will probably be using them to man the lascannon batteries seen here

this guys has been on the shelf 90% completed for a while now, so not much was needed to get em tabletop ready.

One of these things is not like the other...

thats it for today.. get back to work people!!! ;)
-Brose

Angels of Absolution Terminator Completed!

2011-09-13T12:12:00.006-05:00

After pulling this model out of the "in progress" case and working on him on and off for 2 weeks he's finally done!This was the remaining arm that needed to be completed. Nothing too fancy - some script and some painted scratches.This photo is to show off some of the weathering on the feet and some more painted scratches. Scratches were done with a couple of swipes of Badab Black Wash or Devlan Mud Wash on top of each other and then a Skull White highlight below it. The weathering was some stippled Snakebite Leather and Bubonic Brown, followed by some spot washing with Devlan Mud. The sticks coming out of the base are made from broom bristle.

This a WIP shot from the last update just to show the freehand Veteran symbol again.These are some of the projects on my desk right now. I don't realistically believe that I'll cruise through 2 more Terminators. I'll be lucky if I finish one more. I have a hobby article in mind though so that's where Terminators in multiple stages come in. I would like to finish that Assault Marine though. I started the squad around 1995 and am at 7 fully painted models. If I could complete the squad this year that would be stellar - even if they don't fare very will these days in game play.

Finally, completion of this model now adds 2 points to my painting tally for the year - exceeding the 18 points I earned in total last year! Wooohooo. It's all surplus from here on out! Also when I was updating my model purchases for the year I forgot to include a box of 5 Grey Knights.

Angels of Absolution Terminator WIP Pt II

2011-09-07T12:27:00.005-05:00

I haven't been as productive as I would have hoped since last week. I've been painting along but have only successfully completed one arm. I'm working on the power fist arm right now but I won't finish it until after the sun goes down tonight at the earliest. My next day off isn't until the middle of next week so I figured I'd take a couple shots of the arm I did finish. I'm really happy with how the veteran marking came out. I labored for a while trying to figure out what to put on that shoulder pad, flipping through countless terminator pics until I settled on this option. Its very time consuming but that's just how I do things.

While I'm at it, and since its such a short post I should probably mention that I've made a couple of other model purchases this year. I also purchased a Caestus Assault Ram and 5 Maximus Pattern Armor Space Marines from Forgeworld. I've managed to keep my purchases to a minimum this year even if Forgeworld keeps tempting me with amazing offerings like the new Boarding Party Space Marines and the Contemptor Dreadnought. I'll probably just save my pennies for those and buy them at Adepticon in April. We'll see.

-Nick

Angels of Absolution Terminator WIP

2011-09-01T07:26:00.008-05:00

I've been extremely quiet with the blog as of late. I was all hobby all the time for the first few months this year but things slowed down to a halt in May as my band was getting ready to go to Europe for a summer tour. I was gone for most of June and July and came home to Chicago to sweltering heat. We don't have central air here at the Maplewood compound so rather than drip sweat onto my models I waited it out.

Well, it happens that things cooled down enough to sit comfortably once more over the last week so I cracked out the brushes and paints and got to work on this guy:

As you can see, he's got no arms completed yet, and you might notice by the crest on the leg that he is an Assault on Black Reach plastic. I think he's coming along pretty well and looks good for a test model. The key things to note at this stage are that on his hip armor I experimented with painting in false engraved detail. This was my first time doing something like this on a model that wasn't scenery. To create the illusion of depth I merely used Bubonic Brown to put down the pattern I wanted to "engrave" and then I painted/drew Brown Ink along the center of the Bubonic Brown lines. The first time out I went for a simple pattern to see how I liked it and I was very pleased.

The other thing you'll note is the red strip along his head. I've never seen anyone else with Angels of Absolution do this (all 2 of you) but The Siege of Vraks vol III shows Angels of Absolution veteran squads having these markings. It stood to reason that the Terminator Squads would do this too as the whole 1st Company should carry the same markings. I think it helps to make him stand out as not "just another Deathwing Terminator" model too.

I should have the arms finished to post early next week.

-Nick

Are We Trying to Make GW Games Something That They Aren't? Understanding Games Workshop

2011-09-01T07:18:00.008-05:00

(written for BoLS)

There have been a flood of op-ed articles discussing tournament vs narrative play and which is superior. Unfortunately sometimes when people get into intense debates they miss the point that the truth lies somewhere in the middle.

This was inspired by a BoLS' article about the Nova Tournament the other day,EDITORIAL: Nova Open: Lights, Camera, Gripe! , which highlights some inherent flaws in how people are trying to adapt Games Workshop's games in a way they never intended, and that really reinforces many of GW's long standing policies that people have repeatedly railed against.

FAQ's and the Internet

GW used FAQ's and Errata heavily during 3^rd Edition and even offered up printable sections of text to cut out and paste directly into your Codexes and Army Books. By 4^th Edition they started only FAQing things sporadically and one of their stated reasons was that rapid and repeated FAQ updates resulted in conflicts because everyone was not on the same page. It made more sense to have people all running around with the same information, for better or for worse, than to have people running around with all sorts of different wording and rulings and muddling the gaming environment with additional confusion. The internet has always insisted otherwise, of course. This weekend's NOVA championship perfectly proves GW's assertion. The title bout was decided with complete disregard for a FAQ that no one read or properly interpreted if they had read it. So the question becomes, “do regular FAQ/Errata updates necessarily benefit the gaming public as much as they think they do? And do they even pay attention if they don't radically affect the player base in some way?

Games Workshop Tournaments, Painting, Composition, and Prize Support

I worked for Games Workshop from 1998-2001 our number one concern was with creating committed hobbyists. Tournaments were a way of getting hobbyists together to play, but the focus was always on playing for the joy of playing, and the best hobbyists received the biggest accolades for their achievements. The player with the best composition and painting scores ruled the day, and walking away with the best general award really didn't mean all that much. It was understood that the rules weren't designed for tournament play and there were a multitude of articles on the “Spirit of the Game” in White Dwarf to help reinforce that rolling dice was good fun but it wasn't as much about winning or losing as it was about having a good time, talking about the hobby, and showing off your hobby skills. One of the things they kept highly contained was prize support. This wasn't because they were stingy as many people believed, it was because when you provide a big prize, people become cut throat, and they no longer push their skills for the love of the hobby and a pat on the back, but instead for lust for the big prize. We've seen all of these things whittled away over time. Almost no one in the tournament circuit believes in composition scores anymore, painting has taken a backseat to generalship, and prize support is a much bigger incentive than a being known for having a great looking army and playing it well. As we deregulate the playing environment is it surprising that it has spun out of control and become dictated by the most competitive players? And does the current model for tournament play reward people for buying their way to victory by changing armies every time the metagame changes, and punish those who “work with what they have”? It seemed that the old mind set leveled the playing field by rewarding hobbyists who might not be the best players or have the shiniest new toys, but who have come to make the most of their chosen army and models through years of painting and playing their beloved army.

Are We Really Video Streaming Tournament Games Now?

I'm not sure when miniature wargaming became Wimbeldon, but as was pointed out in Brent's article, Warhammer is an imperfect game and is based upon social interaction. In its current incarnation, it is not a closed system with clearly defined boundaries, simple rules, and a judge overseeing each play and making the call as to whether it is legal or not legal. We're still operating under the idea that wargaming is more of a open “gentleman's agreement” because there are so many variables that affect game play. Do we want it to continue along this path in an attempt to sterilize and hone game play? Or should people who seek that sort of game play find a new hobby instead of trying to force Games Workshop's games into a mold that it does not seem to fit?

Can Games Workshop Meet Everyone's Gaming Demands?

Games Workshop has always been a model company first, and the games were designed to put existing model collections to use and encourage people to buy even more models. On the internet there are thousands of voices all telling GW what to do. Games Workshop keep churning out army books, codexes, and expansions that sell more models. Warhammer Fantasy has been trying to overwhelm and entice us with “Wow!” inducing models, and 40K is coming up on its next revision that could very well try to do the same with true “flyers”. When codex creep is evident, like with Blood Angels and Grey Knights, everyone screams, “FOUL!” When Sisters of Battle or Tyranids are clearly tempered and don't get the same creep, everyone screams “FOUL!” Which voices are they supposed to listen to? Everyone says that balance is the key, but there are too many variables to balance fully and when Jervis tried to balance the system by minimizing wargear and stripping the armies down to their component parts, everyone cried “BORING!” It seems to me that maybe the customer base isn't this all knowing entity people believe it to be, because every time they try to appease the great customer beast it only gets more enraged. Maybe the customer base is trying to make miniature wargaming too many things that it is not?

Square Peg – Round Hole?

The question isn't “are tournaments bad or good?” or is “narrative play superior to tournament play?” because I find both fun, and I don't see why I should have to choose or why the two can't be combined. I know I like both because I love playing games. Though the game was designed with a winner and a loser, it was designed with so much flexibility that there are countless areas for exploration, as well as for confusion and exploitation. I think how much fun you have with it comes from accepting the game for what it is, instead of forcing it to be something it is not. Maybe we'd all get more out of it if we kept that in mind?

Personally, I love tournaments with creative scenarios and unique constraints. The most fun I've had at a tournament in the last 5 years was at a Cities of Death tournament where it felt like game play was turned on its head and top armies were usurped by 3^rd tier ones. Do the current competitive tournaments add anything to the hobby? Should Games Workshop focus on appealing entirely to competitive gamers? Is the exodus to other systems necessarily a reaction of disillusionment with Games Workshop's products and philosophy or is it that the customer base has gotten so large and disparate that they are actually disillusioned with each other and are fleeing to systems that are filled with more like minded players or hobbyists? Are you getting the most satisfaction you can from the hobby and what is the secret of your success?

-Nick

17th AdMech Leman Russ Battle Tank and more....

2011-08-16T18:47:00.007-05:00

Going through all my admech stuff and doing some tidying up of vehicles...
First up is the 17th AdMech Leman Russ 'Goliath'

Next up, the 24th Hydra Battery Tank 'Deus Mechanicus'

And next week, 4 finish Chimera's!

AdMech Primaris Psyker (or Overseer) v2

2011-08-14T19:54:00.007-05:00

Just painted a couple things up today.. First up the official Sanctioned Psyker GW Model...

Next up a quick and dirty Vox Carrying Servitor.

got some stuff in the queue too!

Crimson Fists Mechanicus Sternguard Part 2....

2011-08-11T10:32:00.007-05:00

Hey all, so was switching my list up a bit for Ard Boyz and decided to add another 10 man sternguard unit in a drop pod... Late last year i made a 6 man CF Mechanicus Sterngaurd squad Seen Here., thought i would just continue with this theme and fill out this squad. I wanted to add 5 combi-melta's to the mix too, but only had one, so i went ahead and bought some of that wonderful instant mold stuff and gave a go a making a mold. I gotta say, this stuff is wonderful and so easy to work with. I don't have a photo of the mold i made out of the combi melta.. but here is one i made for just a melta gun...

Process was easy and within 2 days, had all the combi-melta's i needed. So without further ado... here are my 5 new guys...
Group Shot...

Some Close-ups

Here's the ringer though... Ard Boyz is already full at my local gaming store :( Oh well, maybe next year!
Edit....
there is now a spot open, attending!!!!

Cheers,
Brose

Prepping for Ard Boyz...

2011-07-27T13:04:00.004-05:00

This is just a me being bored at work post...
Decided on my list for Ard Boyz this year and here it is in all its (hopeful) glory

Crimson Fist's 3rd Company with 1st Company Assault Terminator Compliment (and not really very fluffy, but also containing Vulkan)...

Forgefather Vulkan He'stan

Terminator Librarian Storm Shield
Might of the Ancients; Null Zone
(attached to)
7x Assault Terminators 4x TH/SS, 3x TWLC
Landraider Crusader Multi-Melta

8x Assault Terminators 4x TH/SS, 4x TWLC
Landraider Crusader Multi-Melta

10x Assault Terminators 6x TH/SS, 4x TWLC (foot sloggers)

10x Tactical Squad Power Weapon, Meltabombs, Meltagun, Missile Launcher
Rhino

10x Tactical Squad Power Weapon, Meltabombs, Meltagun, Missile Launcher
Rhino

8x Assault Marines 1x Plasma Pistol, 1x Power Weapon, Meltabombs

Hellpit Abomination to Daemon Prince Conversion...

2011-07-20T12:29:00.019-05:00

Some of you may have seen these photo's over on Dakka, but since I am completely done with the conversion, thought it was time to post it here.
So, as some of you may know, i am working on several armies these days... one of them being a Death Guard inspired army. When I saw the Skaven Hellpit Abomination model come out

I immediately thought of Nurgle and how that might be a good conversion for a Greater Daemon of Nurgle, so bought the model and decided to give it a go...
first up are some picts of the model in its infantcy.

Really took alot less green stuff to make it work than I thought it would.
Next up are some of the first go at painting it with the addition of wings...

Not too bad, but the more i stared at it, the less i like the look of the legs.. plus, i really don't like CSM Greater Daemons (no wings, no eternal warrior) so decided to try and cut the legs off and make him a bit smaller and closer to the Nurgle Daemon Prince model. I am now happy with it, here are some of the finished picts.

and finally here is a pict of him compared to the Nurgle Daemon Prince.

Thats its for now, hope you all enjoy...
next up is another command squad for my AdMech army made up of melta toting RT Robots!!!!
Cheers,

The Freaks Come Out at Night...

2011-07-19T17:07:00.007-05:00

So, here we have another army that I've never played with, and probably never will... My 7th Edition Warhammer Fantasy Battle Night Goblins... Sans 2 Shamans that have gone and hid under a mushroom somewhere...

I realize that I have way more interest in painting armies these days that playing most games.

And... like most things I'm involved in, this army was done on the cheap;

I got the Giant as some sort of prize in a tournament when that box first came out a few years ago

The 2 spear chukkas, the fanatics, and the wolves were picked up in trades.

All the infantry is BFSP, and hence, very cheap.

The snotling pumpwagon was an Ebay purchase that needed to get dripped and stripped.

I think that the only thing that I actually purchased at a retail outlet for this army, was the Big Boss on the Giant squig, which is a really fun model to paint.

Now that I've got it done, I've decided that I don't really want to learn 8th edition fantasy, so I'm going to sell it... On to new armies.... Currently being worked on are several epic armageddon forces, Dark Eldar (which is soon to be my only remaining 40k army), and a sci-fi skirmish game called Wreck Age that me and my friend Matt have been working on. (shameless self promotion).

I really would have loved to do one of these goblins in a wide brimmed hat, and maybe another one break dancing... Maybe next time!

Discos don't open till after dark
And it ain't till twelve till the party really starts
And I always had to be home by ten
Right before the fun was about to begin
Crowds of people lined up inside and out
Just one reason, to rock the house
But in the day time the streets was clear
You couldn't find a good freak anywhere, 'cause

The freaks come out at night
The freaks come out at night

Necromunda, Confrontation Tech Gang, Adeptus Mechanicus

2011-06-15T11:02:00.010-05:00

Hey All,
I recently saw some Necromunda, Confrontation Tech Gang, Adeptus Mechanicus models on ebay and was completely hooked and just had to buy them. I'd never seen these sculpts before and was really stoked on em, so I ended up bidding more than i normally would have for old metal models... and wasn't let down when i won and received em in the mail...
They were all missing arms (except for the powerfist guy) he originally had a storm bolter in his left hand.. switched that out for a bolt pistol as there aren't very many storm bolter options in the IG codex. I also added green stuff cowls to all the models and made the rest into a flamer squad.. maybe they will be used as a veteran squad...
Anyways, its an overcast day so the photo's are a little dark, tried a couple different positions, so forgive me for the duplicates, but i just couldn't choose which looked better.
Without further ado...
here is the sergeant(?)

and here are the flamer dudes (there are only 3 models)...

This pair of eyes are the first ones im actually stoked on.. thank brian C for the input last time!

Thats it for now... i recently broke down and bought some Chimera's from GW that should be here tomorrow, so that will most likely be my next project!
Until then!
Cheers,
Brose

AdMech Vendetta Gunship

2011-06-09T12:03:00.006-05:00

Hey all, been working on this one for quite a while. After looking at the photo, may change the paint scheme a little bit more before I call this one all good. But regardless, wanted to get this one out there as im pretty proud. This was also my second attempt at hand drawing the mechanicus symbol at this scale (my other attempt can be seen here, ya gotta scroll down abit to see the back of a Russ.. Definitely happier with this one. I would like to practice some other unique identifiers eventually (like adding numbers etc to make this one unique) but it scares the hell outta me that im gonna mess up, so i haven't done it yet... So without further ado, here ya go

First up, a top shot.

Next up, a look inside the cabin with the heavy bolters shooting away at xeno scum!

A nice side shot, showing the twin linked Lascannons from a Landraider sprue

The other side, notice the addition of another las next to the cockpit.

And lastly, here is a slightly closer look at the cockpit itself..

The one thing i may try and change, just to add a little more color change, is paint the tail flaps straight black, just to mix it up a little more.. But maybe not too ;)
Thats it for now folks, Enjoy!
Brose

AdMech Command Squad (Blight Wheel Minatures)

2011-06-03T13:24:00.009-05:00

Hey all, I recently saw a new set of miniatures brought to you by Blight Wheel Miniatures. Thought they'd maybe make a nice addition to my AdMech Guard Army, so went ahead and bought a set. They are reasonably priced (for a smaller company) it was $29 for 5 resin models.. Overall, I love the sculpt's... I will say that (IMO) the arms and other accessories were way to fragile for a tabletop miniature... most parts broke fairly quick either by trying to carefully cut them off the sprue, or even by trying to glue them on the model... Fortunately, i have a ton of left over bionic bits from MaxMini, so decided to swap out a few of the arms since i think these bits are pretty cool. As always, my miniature are painted to what i feel are tabletop readiness and not alot of detail put into em. I do notice alot more flaws on the photo's, but eh im ok with that.
So without further ado.. here they are all painted up...
First up a group shot...

Here is the Company Commander.. wanted to give him a power weapon, but didn't have any in my bits box :( Sure i could use a count as in friendly games..

Here is my Vox-Caster... didn't turn out as good as my aspirations, but again, im ok with it.

The next 3 are my plasma dudes.. again, didn't have actual plasma guns, but tons of pistols in my bitz box, so thought i would double them up and make it a little more plausible as plasma gun count as..

Last guy is a bit blurry, but i think you get the gist...

Well, thats it for now, for those who have AdMech Armies, i would suggest you give these models a go, as overall i feel they are a nice addition to my army.
Cheers,
Brose

Death Guard Bikers...

2011-05-17T17:08:00.006-05:00

Hey all, couple more models to throw down.. these ones have been modeled by not painted forever, decided to just give em the quick death guard washes and rust and get em out there.. 5 more to go!!!

Group shot...

Champion with Powerfist

Regular Biker dude...

Enjoy...

The Biggest Loser! AWC Series 2011 Tournament #1

2011-05-15T19:53:00.003-05:00

This weekend I attended Adeptus Windy City's first tournament of the season. From what I have gathered they try to run a tournament every month and vary up the points and scenarios each time. I think this is the first AWC tournament I have attended, though a few years back I did go to a Cities of Death tournament in Wisconsin that I found on AWC - I'm not sure if it was part of that year's series.

I purchased my ticket online a few weeks ago as a way to get some games in (I think I only played 3 games last year), and to see if smaller tournaments were as fiercely competitive as Adepticon has become. Additionally, I thought it would be a great incentive to get some painting in. As each week passed though, I failed to get any painting time in. The only advanced preparation I did was to read a few sections of the 5th Edition Rulebook before bed. Instead, two days before the big event I hammered out an army list based upon what I had painted and a couple of wacky ideas I had. In those two days I feverishly attempted to paint 4 Hunter Killer Missiles and 4 Storm Bolters. I failed on all accounts, and scrapped all my wacky ideas. So 12 hours before the tournament I put the finishing touches on a rather dull Dark Angel's list that used every fully painted model I had and only 4 partially finished models - the best showing I've ever made in that regard.

Now when I say that I had a dull Dark Angel's list, I'm not exaggerating. The best things in the Dark Angel's Codex are Deathwing, Ravenwing, Sammael, and Belial. I had none of those things. I had a Chaplain, 2 Dreadnoughts, 4 Tactical Squads in Rhinos, an Assault Squad, a Devastator Combat Squad in a Razorback, and a Whirlwind. All of these units had minimal upgrades. I had 2 power weapons in the whole army, as an example. I didn't take advantage of any of the special rules in Codex: Dark Angels or in the latest FAQ update. So I'll be the first to admit - my list was lacking.

The night before the tournament I still didn't know how I was getting there. I was originally going to borrow my girlfriend's car but she got asked to work. I sent an early morning e-mail to my friend Brian as a last minute attempt to avoid taking a $30 cab ride to the Battle Bunker. Forty five minutes later I had my ride confirmed. Thanks again Brian!

I hurriedly packed up my army. I got my things together and printed out my lists. I was exhausted and had a headache before I even got in the car with Brian. When we arrived at the Battle Bunker and were assigned our tables I was actually nervous. I've been so out of the loop with playing games that I was worried I'd forget all the rules. Plus, I haven't faced a new Codex since Codex: Imperial Guard so I knew I'd be at a loss against the last five Codices to come out: Space Wolves, Tyranids, Blood Angels, Dark Eldar, and Grey Knights. I was already apologizing to my first player for being rusty before we even started rolling dice.

I was paired up against a gentleman named John who played Necrons. His army was a fairly scary collection of mostly Destroyers and Heavy Destroyers. I know that to a seasoned veteran of 5th Edition, Necrons are far from scary, but when you have almost no upgrades and most of your firepower comes in the form of bolter fire, they can be intimidating as hell. I wiped out a 200 point unit of Destroyers pretty early on but then he neutralized my suppressive fire by taking out my Dreads and Razorback. After that I still fought hard but it was a losing battle. He was charging my units and winning, and as I understand it, Necrons shouldn't be charging anyone. It was a fun game and I'm sure he enjoyed soundly thrashing me with what is generally regarded as a hard luck army.

My second game was against Dave, a Space Wolves player. He had a lot of vehicles like I did and he deployed for battle in a way I had many times before, so I wasn't as worried as I should have been. He had some bad dice rolling early on so I thought I was doing okay. Then he closed in, his luck regulated, and I got to face the frustration of his Long Fangs who could split fire, the special character who could throw a hammer through my tanks, and some sort of combo where he could re-roll 1's and one of the models in that squad had Terminator armor so he basically needed 2 successive 1's to take a wound. I didn't feel swindled by my opponent so much as I had Codex envy - or at least special rule envy. This was my life without upgrades.

The final game of the tournament had me facing a light hearted 14 year old named Mike. Over the years I've seen people talk a lot of crap about being paired up against teenagers like it's some sort of a chore, or even an affront. Maybe it's my former GW background or maybe it's because I'm surrounded by young people through playing in bands and I just sort of "get" teenagers, but this game was my most fun game of the day. His army was a weirdo hodge podge of random stuff to form a Salamanders army but despite me making a strong showing early on, he kept an eye on his objectives and I was just having fun killing stuff. When the dust settled I was soundly defeated for the 3rd time.

The best part of the day for me was having people coming up and complimenting my army. I may be an awful player, but all of the positive feedback made me glow - at least on the inside, I may have still worn moderate scowl since I was amongst strangers. Even if I can't win a game to save my life at least my love of the hobby shines through in other ways that people get stoked on. It really means the world to me, especially considering I've been working on the army since 1994. I was using models I painted before my 3rd opponent was born and I still can't field a fully painted army.

Greg Swanson did a great job of moving things along and facilitating the tournament. The scenarios were sort of boring. They were selected as a primer for some other tournament a bunch of people are going to coming up. Even if they each used different deployment they all had the exact same objectives which made all of the games feel the same. I actually miss tournaments where all of the scenarios varied widely and the goal was something other than objective counters or kill points (or in this case both). Of course, I'm the guy who's played every mission in the 3rd and 4th Edition rulebooks, all the Cities of Death missions, and almost all of the 5th Edition missions hidden in the back of end of the book. You don't have to get all crazy with multiple objectives like the Adepticon scenarios - just give me something that makes me go, "That was really cool!"

In the end I had a really good time despite the exhaustion, unpreparedness, crap army list, and rust coated playing skills. I walked away with two awards: Best Appearance and Biggest Loser and I can say both with a smile on my face. The next AWC tournament is in June, but its right before my band leaves for Europe and I doubt I'll be able to find the time. Since we'll be gone for a full month I might miss the July tournament as well. I'll just have to wait and see.

I may suck at 40K but I'll kick all of your asses at Settlers of Catan. Honest!

AdMech Primaris Psyker (or Overseer)

2011-05-12T14:41:00.000-05:00

Hey all, spring has arrived here in the NW and life has temporarily taken over my 40k enthusiasm. I've had a couple models in queue to work on, but currently they sit collecting dust, just haven't had the desire to work on em... but I did recently purchase a Forgeworld Titan Enginseer on ebay and that got my creative juices flowing again..

Got a few more bids on some DeathGuard models, so they might be next up if i win em... Until then, take care all!

Reflections on Adepticon 2011

2011-04-21T18:47:00.007-05:00

I'm a little late on this. What can you do? Most of the blogs are heralding Adepticon as another joyous success. This was the 1st year in 6 years that I did not compete. The internet has sadly taken a lot of the joy out of competitive gaming for me. Back in the day I was an okay gamer guaranteed to eek out a middle of the road score with decent game play, and painting and composition score that would push me above the 50% mark. Two years ago, as I sat in the bottom percentile I had a gent say, "Man, you played a really good game. You just don't have a competitive list." I just do the best I can with the models I have painted. Up until a few years ago that was all I needed. Last year, as I looked in either direction from where we played in the team tournament, every table in either direction was a "leaf blower" list, including our opponents at the time. Its of no fault of the Adepticon organizers that Adepticon has been sort of disappointing these last couple years. Its the fault of the gaming base. The tournament scene is dominated by internet lists and its draining the fun out of the experience for me; so this year I elected to sit the tournaments out.

One of my favorite parts of Adepticon has always been walking around the tournament floor and looking at all of the armies, many lavishly displayed with pride and care. Once again, this year I was underwhelmed. Brian Carlson, as always, brought a fantastic looking army and this Ork army was a real standout:

It was a really cool army with lots of conversions. I'm sure someone else documented it in greater detail somewhere else on the net. My point being that I think that the shift from "hobbyist" to "gamer" is hurting the tournament experience as well. People talk a lot of crap on composition scores but composition lends itself to seeing the game as an extension of the hobby instead of the other way around. When generalship becomes the focus over all else then armies are no longer crafted for their visual appeal. Rather they are purpose built for the single utility of victory. Winning games is great, but I want to have a fun game against cool people who want to talk about their armies and trade painting techniques and oddball bits of fluff that really inspired them. I don't want to talk about the metagame and net lists. It was that level of homogenization that quickly drove me away from Magic:TG. However, flat lifeless cards lend themselves to that style of play - richly detailed hand painted models and scenery do not.

So what joy did Adepticon bring me? I patiently waited for an hour in line to buy a Caestus Assault Ram from the Forgeworld stand. I spent a lot of time looking at resin bases and other hobby aids. This was actually the most time I have ever spent in the store. The variety of hobbyist made products is ever expanding and the quality just keeps getting better and better. I'm really curious to see how this will develop and I'm hoping it stays more of a wide array of "cottage industry" rather than developing into the more slick corporate "players" that you get from some of the new companies.

Hypocritically, I don't have much desire to stray from Games Workshop. Like a guy who sticks by Honda or Toyota because they make a "quality product", I have to say nothing GW related gave me the "wow" factor I so desperately seek at these events. I want an army, or a table, or a new model to knock my socks off. Instead, the thing that really turned my crank at this event was Warmachine related. These pictures are from two tables in the Privateer Press room. I honestly don't know which game they belong to but this scenery was beautiful and was the only thing that I was super stoked to take pics of.

I love the weathering on these copper roof tops. So simple but such a dramatic touch. I'll definitely be stealing this.After half a day I was done with Adepticon. Not that it didn't have anything interesting going on. The Killzone Tournament tables were quite nice and though a friend was pushing me hard to enter some of my models in the Crystal Brush - the top tier models were brilliant and out of my league. Well done! If I didn't get scheduled to work Saturday and Sunday at my job I probably would have come back to participate in a couple of the hobby seminars.

Finally, the biggest thing I came away with from Adepticon was a sense of needing to put my money where my mouth is. I'm a firm believer that if you don't like the direction something you love and are immersed in is going, you intercede to change the dynamic. I started discussing with one of the Adepticon organizers an event I'd like to run. With a little luck maybe we'll see a tournament next year that embodies the aspects of the hobby that I love - the type of event I'd love to participate in myself. We'll see.

More Crimson Fists Assault Terminators...

2011-03-29T14:42:00.007-05:00

Hey all, just finished up 11 more assault terminators and thought i'd share em with ya...
gearing up for 'ard boyz and this is what i think im gonna go with
Pedro attached to
10x TH/SS Termies on foot

librarian in terminator armor attached to
7x (4 TH/SS, 3 LC) Termies in a Landraider Crusader

8x (4 TH/SS, 4 LC) Termies in a Landraider Crusader

10x tactical melta, missile in a rhino

10x tactical melta, missile in a rhino

10x assault marines jumppacks plasma pistol powerweapon

might change a couple things around but not much
Any how.. here's the newest additions to this list.

group shot...

some closeups..

Thats it....

Chaplain in Terminator Armor (fail)...

2011-03-21T16:16:00.007-05:00

This model looks way cooler in person.. for some reason the light is off in the these photos (IMO).. Anyways been quite here for a while, so thought i'd post something up...
Im currently working on 10 more Assault Terminators (photo's coming soon). Had some extra terminator bitz laying around, so thought i would try and build me a Chaplain.. I had a set of legs, the back part of the torso, the crozius arm, an extra storm shield, and a storm bolter arm... looking though my regular bitz box, i found a chest plate from Mark VIII armor and thought it would look alright as the front, just a little green stuff and some trimming and it actually doesn't look too bad...

for the life of me i still can not paint eye's... :(
anyhow,
the storm shield was for the right arm. so had to cut away the thumb and greens stuff a new on one after inverting and pinning it to a stormbolter arm (with the bolter cut off obviously). Also had to file away whatever was on there originally and then i gave a try at sculpting a skull.. eh.. not so hot, but looks ok from a distance... also add a fist's logo from my green stuff mold...

didn't have to do anything to the other arm

oh yea.. guess what.. Terminator Chaplains can not have storm shields.. damn it!!!! guess i should have read up a bit more before trying this one out.. oh well, the back of the shelf it shall go...
Thats it for today folks.. back to work!!!

-Brose

Angels of Absolution Rhino

2011-03-02T12:50:00.006-06:00

I've been working on finishing this Rhino for weeks now. It seemed like it would never end. I painted bits that never got attached (like a searchlight) and getting a nice thorough coat on every inch of it seemed to go on forever. I'm finally declaring it finished. The sad thing is, all the hours of labor were undone by going a little too heavy with the weathering and now I'm disappointed. I may end up going back and redoing the areas around the exhaust stacks. We'll see how I feel about it tomorrow. As of this moment I'm sick of looking at it so its going in the display case so I can move on.

I am now tied with last year's total painting output at 18 points. My updated stats should be 18 Points with 10 infantry and 2 tanks. Go me! -Nick

Seattle Wargamming 40k Tournament...

2011-02-28T10:56:00.003-06:00

Hey all,
So a brand new store just opened up in Seattle proper and they held there first 2000 point 40k singles tournament yesterday... I was still riding a slight high from recently co-winning a team tournament held at a GW store up north, my MVP's of that army list were a Terminator Librarian attached to a 7x Assault Terminator squad... so I decided, why not take two of em... two is always better than one right??? and its not really Landraider/Assault Terminator spam if your only running two of em right?? ;) anyways feeling pretty beat so gonna cut right to the chase.. I ended up winning all 3 games, no tabling by any means.. just good sound tactical decisions based on really paying attention to the missions (which were straight outta the book, so nothing fancy) again, anyways...

Here is a photo of my army

And here is a copy of the list i ran..

Librarian in Terminator Armor with Storm Shield
Force Weapon; Might of the ancients; Null Zone

7x Assault Terminators
4x Thunder Hammers/Storm Shields; 3x Lightning Claws

Landraider Crusader
Multi-Melta; Extra Armor

Librarian in Terminator Armor with Storm Shield
Force Weapon; Might of the ancients; Null Zone

7x Assault Terminators
4x Thunder Hammers/Storm Shields; 3x Lightning Claws

Landraider Crusader
Multi-Melta; Extra Armor

10x Tactical Squad
Plasma Gun; Melta Gun; Powerfist
Rhino

10x Tactical Squad
Missile Launcher; Melta Gun; Powerfist
Rhino

5x Assault Marines
Plasma Pistol; Power Weapon; Melta Bombs

and here is what happened..
Game 1 against a pure Thousand Sons List... Mission: Kill Points
(co-blog author Scott.. you would have been proud of this guy!)
He had 3 tactical squads in rhinos, 2 Daemon Princes, Lascannon Predator, a couple dreads, and a small daemon squad.
I parked my tactical squads in their rhino's hull down and just shot out the hatch pretty much the whole game... i don't think they did a thing either, well except for one of them dying that is ;)
Terminators were the MVP's and brought down 7 kill points while he was able to get 3 outta me.. Game 1, win 1-0

Game 2 against a pure Nurgle Daemon Army..
He had lots of nurglings, the great unclean one and lots of other nasty big buggers...
This game was table quarters with 1 objective in each players quarter...
To play safe.. i held everything in a tight ball around my objective and just waited for him come to me.. in the end it was a good tactic as his was only able to pretty much send a unit at a time to come after my objective and each time i was able to destroy said units with my terminators... i was able to do a last minute contesting of his objective with one of my landraiders too.. (sorry but no action pictures this round as it was tense.. but here are a couple photo's of his army)
Game 2, win 2-0

Game 3.. i was slightly worried as i saw earlier that i was either going to be going up against a mech Blood Angels army (which i felt like i probably would have done horribly against) or a foot slogging Space Wolves list (which i felt more confident about doing good agains)... luck of the draw pit against the latter and i was excited to see this through... This mission was 5 objective markers and pitched battle.
He had 3 blood claw units.. 2 missile launcher long fangs.. some jump pack wolves (not sure their name) and a couple multimelta landspeeders..
from the go, i decided to split my army in half and hope that he would do the same so it would be easier to piece meal him... by the second turn i was able to park on landraider on an objective with a back up tactical squad behind.. on another objective i did the opposite... it was a good choice too as the first LR was easily within assault range of one the markers on his side of the board and it was just enough of a deterrent to keep two of his squads away from those objectives til the 5th turn.. good tactic as i was able to do a last minute push and tie up those units in combat, contesting it, while bring my own tactical squad up and claiming mine.. while on the other side of the board i was able to piece meal his units and claim another objective.... Game 3, WIN 3-0...
The blood angles were still playing after we finished and i knew that if she was to win, i would probably take second as i knew she had way more kill points than me in the first game.. luckily (for me that is) she was only able to pull out a draw... so i won the tournament with the lovely 'Best General' title and a $50 gift card!!!

I have to say, all three people i played against were awesome player and over the event was one of the funner tournaments i've played in... So excited about this new store opening up as its really close to home and ran by two really great people and players!!!
Next weekend is the TSHFT tournament which should have over 50 players and runs over 2 days.. going to bring this list again and depending on how it goes.. write up another article!
Cheers and thanks for reading!
Brose

Green Stuff Crimson Fist Terminator Shoulder Pad Mold

2011-02-23T10:24:00.008-06:00

Hey all, so a couple years ago at the adepticon bitz trading night i picked up a super sweet deal on 15 Forgeworld Terminator shoulder pad upgrades. Was so excited to upgrade all the excess amounts of old metal (shooty) terminators i had stored away for just such an occasion.. well i was gravely disappointed that first time a broke one out and noticed that the FW upgrades were meant only for the newer style terminators, so with a sigh, i put em back in their coffin and forgot about em until recently... I've been experimenting with making AdMech green stuff stamps lately (with some good success and some miserable failures) and noticed the upgrades just sitting in their bag and thought i would give a go at making a decent green stuff mold.. it really only took 2 tries to get this one to work, which totally surprised me as i'd try to do Mechanicus shoulder pad molds and found it pretty difficult to work with a curved surface... Anyhow, you'll have to forgive me for the slight blurriness of the photos as it was hard to just focus on such small pieces..
First photo is just the FW shoulder pad..

i had to kinda ruin this one to get a nice full circle around the fist as there were purity seals molded into it, but nothing a sharp x-acto didn't take care of...
I then mixed up my green stuff, rolled it into a ball big enough to cover the fist, then dampened the ball and pressed it slightly against a small piece of glass. This makes for a nice clean surface (getting rid of finger prints and folds) for pressing against whatever you are trying to mold. I then applied liberal amounts of saliva to the pad and carefully wrapped the whole thing in green stuff... making sure to press evenly and solidly around it...

I then let this set up for bout 1/2 hour and very very carefully pealed it away taking care not to change the curvature of the shoulder pad.. I then let this piece dry over night. The next day i added a bit more green stuff to the back to make a handle of sorts.

and let that dry again for another day. Now i was ready to give it ago with one of the older plastic shooty terminator arms.. You have to applied lots of saliva to the new mold (or other lubricants) when doing this next part as the green stuff really likes to try and stick into all those small nooks and crevices. So i ball up a small bit of green stuff and put it directly on the arm itself, then slowly (yet firmly) press the mold onto the arm, making sure to press hard enough to squeeze out the excess green stuff and on my first go i got this one!

and finally here is the painted up test arm, will definitely add some purity seals and some other bling with doing this on the rest of my old terminators..

I do recommend patience when trying to make molds with green stuff as i had many many failures when first starting out..
ps, i recently heard about this stuff and am excited to give it ago!
Cheers,
Brose

AdMech Manticore Rocket Launcher

2011-02-19T21:22:00.007-06:00

Hey All..
So last week, my one and only 40k Seattle buddy (Nakoa) invited me to be a teammate for a local 40k team tournament. I jumped at the opportunity as i do not get to play much at all these days.. The tournament was 2000 points per team with a required HQ and 2 troop choices per player. I've been playing my Crimson Fist's for tournaments now for a couple years, so pretty used to em now and decided to play em here as he brought space wolves. The one exception is I ran a Terminator Librarian with Null Zone and Might Of The Ancients and I have to say, he was by far the MVP of the event for me and Null Zone is the reason why. That is such a awesome power, especially with everyones invulnerable saves these days. Here is a brief run down of the games...
Game 1 versus Dark Eldar and Eldar alliance..
So many skimmers with so many invulnerable saves... good thing the librarian was around to make our opponents fail most ever reroll... we can so close to tabling these guys our spirits were up.. there were 3 objectives and we controlled 2. Win on our end, it was decided at the beginning of the tournament that in case of a tie, the winners would be decided by victory points. so we got close to the full 2000 that game. 1-0
Game 2 versus Mechanicus Space Marine Army
We came into this game a little bit cocky i think. They had 6 dreads, a couple master of the forges, a thunderfire cannon and lots of sniper scouts.. we had quite a bit of long range lascannons, so we decided to make them come to us and whittle them down as they came.. problem was, we couldn't hit a dread as if our lives depended on it... I had 7 Assault Termies (with the Librarian too and 4 Thunder Hammers) that easily took out there termies and landraider then went after one of the dreads.. f'in thing tied up the whole unit for the rest of the game.. neither of us could hit or wound it was insane.. but their dreads just kept coming and got into our lines and wrecked much havoc... This game was straight kill points and they beat us fair and square.. we did manage a fair amount of victory points by the end.. so even though we lost, we still felt we had a good chance of placing in the top 3. 1-1
Game 3 versus necrons..
I haven't played against necrons in quite some time and these guys brought a couple crazy expensive characters and 2 monoliths and the bare bones amount of warriors.. so right off from the start, we decided to ignore everything as much as possible except for the warriors and try and get them to phase out... First turn, one of the guys marches one of his warrior squads within charge range of my terminators.. not sure why, but i said thanks, and wiped them off the board, my teammate was able to assault another warrior squad with some grey hunters and killed off quite a bit of another squad. next turn i was able to assault another warrior squad with a tactical squad and rolled amazing and killed a bunch too. he then used a monolith to teleport them away, except that where he placed them left them ready to be struck down by two packs of grey hunters and that was all we needed to phase them out.. it was over by turn 4... Their monoliths and crazy characters were not able to do a thing.. ouch.. we got full victory points and felt pretty confident we were gonna place 2nd or 1st depending on a game that was still in progress.. 2-1
As it turned out, we won the tournament by round 100 victory points!!! Whoop whoop! We each got a $50 gift card and this is what i bought with it..
My first AdMech Manticore...

Over all, was a great experience and i met a few more people that play 40k round here and this time exchanged numbers, so more games up in coming, hopefully with this damn guard army thats been in the works for so long now!
Cheers,
Brose

More Sentinels of Truth CSMs

2011-02-18T12:25:00.002-06:00

I completed the other half of that Chaos Space marine unit that started last year. I call this particular faction of my Chaos Space Marine the Sentinels of Truth. They are a space marine chapter that has recently gone renegade.

Below is a picture of the complete unit.

I call this first squad "Bastion Squad" which is represented by the castles painted on their shoulder pads.

Also, the missile launcher has an eye painted on his armor signifying their alliance to Derg Corra Amnon and his war band, The Eye of Prophesy

I was happy to get back to power armor. I had forgotten how much fun it is to paint. I purposefully kept the color scheme simple so that I could paint them quickly.

In fact, I would have had them done a Long time ago had I not gotten distracted by skaven. I spent almost all of my hobby time in January gluing nearly 100 skaven models together.

So while Nick is in the lead in the painting race for now, I have a tide waiting to unleash. (Insert evil laugh).

My next project has already driven me to the edge of madness (no, not the Skaven). More on that soon, but here's a hint: It's big, metal, and has wings.

Trudging Along

2011-02-15T13:34:00.004-06:00

I thought I'd be making this post over 2 weeks ago. Hot on the heels of my last batch of five Marienburgers, I pressed myself hard and cranked out four more. Then I got caught up with other things and had the fifth guy to complete the row stuck on my desk ever since. Today I finally had an hour free to finish him up and get some photos taken. So at this point this Spearman unit is at 10 models. The immediate plan is to get the unit to 15 Spearmen models and then 5 Free Company as a detachment. The front rank of Spearmen is on deck for completion as are the Free Company.

As of late I have had models on the brain. When I have free time I'm pouring through my old pile of White Dwarf magazines, old army books, or reading blogs like Dave Taylor Miniatures, Fort Buyaki, and Brian Carlson's Miniatures Workbench among others. I'm very excited to paint, convert, and get models on the table. It also fuels my project ADD like I'm on speed and I am finding it even harder to focus. Tomb Kings got announced as coming in May, I was looking through an old White Dwarf from the release of the last VC book and it has me jonesing to paint Spirit Hosts just because I love their look, and then I've been looking at a lot of Apocalypse articles. This leads me to a question for you all. You see way back when I bought a plastic Baneblade that was originally meant to get a red paint job to go with my Redemptors of Golinar. But the only army I have far enough along to actually warrant an Apocalypse piece would be the Angels of Absolution. I've seen other people put Baneblades with their marines so it isn't a huge deal and converting the Baneblade to look a little more streamline and marine-like could be good fun. Below is an ancient John Blanche drawing of the Dark Angels in massed battle. In their midst is an unusual tank with a Demolisher Cannon on the front, and an unknown turret on top. So the question I ask all of you is, what Baneblade/Stormlord variant do you feel it is most like. I'm going with Hellhammer. But maybe there is something in the Forgeworld range that I'm missing. Any thoughts?

Status update for Nick:

Points: 14

Models Painted: 10 Infantry, 1 Tank

Models Purchased in 2011: 1 (Steam Tank)

The Walking D(r)ead....

2011-02-14T16:29:00.007-06:00

Just tidying some things up...

just built this one from a bitz buy i bought on ebay.. lots of missing stuff and lots of green stuff and it wasn't very fun :(

just added Forgeworld arms and claws to this veteran

next two are oldies but goodies

Crimson Fist Assault Marines

2011-02-08T12:23:00.008-06:00

Bored and in need of a new painting project.. had these guys pinned together for ages just sitting in a box, so thought i'd put em on the ol' desk and have a go at them.. still some touching up to do and some details that may get added later, but table top ready and that is really all im going for these days....

here are a couple photo's of my repainted 'Blue' Librarian..

Daemonic Invasion!

2011-02-03T12:12:00.000-06:00

This past Monday, Nick and I had our first game of 2011. It is also the first time that we have both fielded fully-painted armies against each other! It must have been a sign because Chicago was promptly destroyed in a blizzard the next day (Sorry for that everyone).

Anyway, I had been bragging for weeks that I had finally completed 1500 painted points. However, on the day of the game, I wrote a list that only came to 1350. Oops. I guess I better paint more daemons.

We were both itching to try something out of the battle missions book, so we did a random roll and ended up with the daemon mission "Invasion". In that mission, a warp rift is placed in the center of the table and four objectives are placed equidistant from it.

For the warp rift, Nick broke out this bad boy:

Yeah! Virgin vortex grenade marker!

It was an interesting game. Nick kept everything in reserve which meant that I had two turn to get most of my units in place over the objectives. Unfortunately, that took away the element of surprise that is usually inherent with Daemonic assault. Nick did a very good job of isolating my units and tearing them apart.

I did a fair amount of tearing myself, but the game ended in a draw.

I have to apologize, I didn't get many pictures of Nick's army in action. They looked great, trust me.

Here are some horrors holding down an objective. I usually call these things Space Marine Roombas, but for this game, they were portable Geller field projectors.

The Angels of absolution making a spearhead.

These daemonettes did nothing but hold down this far-flung objective the whole game.

Khorne daemons and Slaanesh daemons working together. Truly a thing of beauty.

Chaplain Vitus banishing the daemon prince. Don't worry, he'll be back...

Crimson Fist Terminator Librarian..

2011-02-02T11:55:00.006-06:00

Hey all, have another tournament coming up next week (team this time) and decided to paint up a Librarian for it, so with out further ado...

here's the thing though... i magnetized the book and somehow lost it in between taking the photos and coming back in :(
*edit*
after giving up searching it finally just appeared on my steps!!!!

Chimera 'Divinity'

2011-01-28T13:33:00.004-06:00

One of the reasons Scott and I have continued to tally our painted models this year is that like many other hobbyists, we have countless unfinished projects laying around. I, in particular, have terrible project ADD. Currently I'm working on a Marienburg Empire army, as you saw in my last post, but after getting 8 models in I got sort of burnt out. So I rummaged through my drawer to find a "1 Day Distraction". In this case, I found an almost complete Imperial Guard Chimera for my Redemptors of Golinar army and decided it was going to be my minor distraction for a day (or in this case, 2 days). I completed the turret which was only partially painted and then went in and did some weathering which was a mix of washes, dry brushing, and sponging. Sponging was something brand new to me and I am happy with the results.

To update the tally:

Nick: 9

Scott: 0

AdMech Heavy Weapons Squads

2011-01-20T15:50:00.002-06:00

Here are a couple more new AdMech Heavy Weapons Squads (pretty overcast outside today, so not the best lighting)...

This first one was actually taken the other day with better lighting, but none of the others pictures i took that day turned out so eh... These are Steel Legion models...

Here are the ones from today...

Im honestly, really chugging through these to make them tabletop ready and not spending a whole lot of time and level of detail i have with my other models.. and im really ok with that ;)
next up are some of the (again only table top ready) lascannon heavy weapon squad.. it was actually way to cold the day i primed them and you can really tell with the texture on some area's of the model.. lesson learned. I do really like these forgeworld tanks and i can foresee picking up some more for different conversion at some point.

and last but not least... here the 3rd Company Crimson Fists Captain (Counts as Khan)

I totally am changing my tournament list last minute for this weekend.. this is my new list (even though i haven't play tested it at all ;)

Pedro with
5x honor guard 3x relic blades
Rhino

Kor'sarro Khan

9x (Mechanicus) Sternguard 4x combi meltas
Rhino

7 Assault Termies 4xTH/SS Landraider Crusader Multagun

2 Ten man tact squads, melta, missile, powerfist, rhino

Landspeeder 2x HB/HB HB

Next post will be all about my experience and perhaps a battle report or two and hopefully lots of pictures!!!
Cheers,
Brose

A Little New, A Little Old

2011-01-19T15:01:00.012-06:00

For the last couple of weeks I have had Warhammer on the brain. Scott got talking about doing Skaven so I dragged out my Empire models and one thing led to another. Last week I posted a photo of the first model I completed this year. I didn't talk much about him, I was just so eager to get his ugly mug up on the blog. As it turns out, he wasn't done after all. After "completing" him I went through a huge crisis of faith in my red scheme. You see, back in the day when I started my Marienburg army I was really determined to paint them quickly. So the red was originally Scab Red with a Red Gore highlight and Red Ink in the recesses. You see, back 10 years ago we didn't have GW's current range of Washes, and the Ink's really left whatever area they touched with a bit of shine. When I pulled out the Militia figure with the Catachan head and red coat, I re-did the red in an effort to mute the original shine, so I painted over most of the coat with Mechanite Red, mixed Mechanite Red and Scorched Brown to paint the recesses, and then I highlighted with Blood Red. The end result was this coat here:

He looks pretty good in the photo but I thought he looked a little flat in person. So then I started experimenting with a ton of combinations of washes and highlights to find what I really wanted. I tried washing thinned down Bestial Brown into the folds which gave a smooth but very dirty look that I ultimately rejected. I tried painting the red areas Mechanite Red, and then highlighting with Blood Red and then Bleached Bone. I followed this with multiple layers of Baal Red Wash. At first I thought it was too shiny so I ended up rejecting that scheme. I sort of regret it now. It was very rich and had a lot of depth.

Ultimately, though I went for a tried and true scheme. My 40K IG army was Blood Red with a Brown Wash, and then Blood Red, Blazing Orange, and Fiery Orange. Unfortunately they look very dirty and very orange, so I wanted to sort of get away from that. Instead I used that same basic idea but with the improved paints that GW has released. The final scheme is Mechanite Red with Devlan Mud Wash painted into the folds. All the raised areas are touched back up with

Mechanite Red to ensure a solid coat where it should be. Then the raised areas are highlighted

with Blood Red and Blazing Orange. It's a pretty generic red scheme but it works. Here are the 2 schemes side by side. The scheme that ends in Blazing Orange is on the right. The scheme that ended in Bleached Bone and several layers of Baal Red Wash is on the left. I'm sure I'll adapt that scheme on something somewhere along the way.

I've been productive. Way more productive than usual. Since the January 1 I have finished 5 models. They are actually from two different units, and three of the Spearmen are roughly identical. I added a feather to one and made sure all of the shields are different. I'm pretty happy with how they are coming out aside from the skin. I spent a decade deliberately not painting human faces so I feel like they need some work. I think the army is going to look pretty good when it all comes together. I have another 100 models to refine my techniques on. Here are the 5 completed models. I haven't determined if the bases will have Static Grass ultimately so the bases are sort of plain for the moment. They are display case quality though, so for our purposes they are done.

Finally I wanted to end with some models that I unearthed while getting pumped on Warhammer. Twelve years ago when I worked for GW - shortly before 6th Edition, I was feverishly working on some Bretonnians. The funny part is that I never completed any Knights. I converted a bunch of figures that didn't have a model in the original Bretonnian book and that didn't make it into the new book, and for some reason I painted a crap load of siege equipment even though I didn't have the models to field it. Ah, to have what seemed like limitless hobby time and resources again so I could do whatever whim that struck me. Anyway, here are the only 5 Bretonnian Spearmen I completed in 1998 along with 2 of the 5 mantlets I completed. Maybe I'll mess around with them a little or maybe I'll hold off until they get their next book. We'll see.

Nick: 5

Scott: 0

Skaven (Sneak Peek)

2011-01-13T12:54:00.004-06:00

Eric has been doing it, so I will too. Here are some plague monks in-progress.

When I decided to start my Skaven army this year, I pulled out my old models. I found these four primed and ready to paint, so I couldn't resist slapping some paint on them.

Each one was painted a little differently, but the overall result is the same. I started with a light base coat (Rotting Flesh) and built on that with a series of washes and some dry-brushing.

This is a departure from my recent work with blending and a return to my older technique of dry brushing and washing. The reason I stopped dry brushing and washing was that I thought the results were too sloppy. However, that actually works to my advantage with skaven (and most importantly, it's faster).

Also, whereas my work with my daemons has been very colorful, these are going to muted and almost monochromatic. I'll spend some extra time on front rank and character models, of course.

Scott's Painting Year in Review

2011-01-12T12:00:00.000-06:00

I don't want gloat too much, but yes I won the painting race between Nick and myself.

However, as Nick so kindly pointed out in his post, I didn't beat the person I was really trying to beat. Namely, myself. In 2009, I painted 32 miniatures. In 2010, I painted 32 miniatures. Exactly.

Now, granted, the mix is a bit different. This year I painted a monstrous creature and two HQ choices. Seen here:

So, had I scored 2009 painting the way I scored 2010, I would have only earned 33 points. So in a round-about, convoluted way, I did beat my total from 2009.

Sort of.

Anyway, here are more close ups...

I also very nearly finished the second half of the CSM unit pictured above. Those will be done soon as I can tear myself away from assembling skaven.

And Thanks again to Nick for spilling the beans, but we have decided to start (or in Nick's case, revive) WHFB armies.

More on CSMs and Skaven coming soon.

My full Admech Army (sneak peak)

2011-01-11T14:29:00.006-06:00

Well, since scott and nick have asked... here is a sneak peak of my army thus far..
its too freaking cold to take pictures outside, so all you get is this slightly blurry overview.. will post individual pictures of everything at some point...

Here is the breakdown
Platoon Command Squad
2x body guards
2x melta
1x plasma
1x vox caster

Platoon squads
10x with plasma, vox, commissar
10x with plasma, vox, commissar
10x with plasma, vox, commissar
3x lascanmon heavy weapon squad
3x lascanmon heavy weapon squad
3x missile launcher heavy weapon squad

Veteran squads
10x with 3x melta, Chimera
10x with 2x flamer, 1x heavy flamer, Chimera

Psyker Battle Squad
10x

Scout Sentinels
2x lascannons
2x autocannons

Leman Russ
Heavy Bolter Turrets

Manitor
Heavy Stubber

Vendetta Gun Ship

comes in at around 1750 points and there you go....

AdMech Guard Heavy Weapons Squad (Sneak peak)

2011-01-10T20:53:00.007-06:00

Hey all,
Well following Nicks advice (about trying to keep up our posts) I have a sneak peak of another AdMech Heavy Weapons squad. This time I wanted to try out the Forgeworld Cyclops Demolition Tank. Unfortunately, its way too cold to prime right now and i don't forsee a let-up in the temperature anytime soon, so thought i would just post the first rough conversions.... I am pinning the weapons on these one, so i can swap out between missiles, autocannons, or lascannons (although the picts here are technically multilaser, going to be doing some more work on em I think)

I am really liking the FW model.. and the best part is its only 3 resin pieces.. so easy to put together!!!
Here is a pict of my first Heavy Weapons Squad using the old Rouge Trader/2nd edition Rapier Laser Destroy chasis

Not going to be able to post again for a while, but the next one will for sure be after the Conquest NW Tournament and now that i have my fancy camera, will be posting some picts and perhaps a battle report.
Til then... Take care,
-Brose

"We'd Rather Stand Alone than Under Imperial Tyranny!"

2011-01-08T15:53:00.004-06:00

Like last year, I have to be the first to post a brand new model to create the illusion of a prolific year ahead. Yesterday I put some time in to complete this model. My goal with the Empire is to paint them relatively fast, so I'm sacrificing some of the precision that I normally strive for. Originally there were a lot of inks used on this model when it was started 10 years ago. I actually went back with Scorched Brown and Mechanite Red to eliminate any of the old inks on the pants and coat. I don't know if I'll do that with all of the models I started for this army back then, but as he was one of only two Militia who had made it past the priming stage, I figured it was a good time to test out newer paints and techniques. The thing I'm most proud of on this model is his "5 o'clock shadow". This is something I've never tried on a model and though the rest of the model is just stock 3 color shading and highlighting, the scruff was something new and exciting for me to try. I mixed a little Codex Grey with Elf Flesh and water and built it up with a few thin coats, leaving his deeper facial lines untouched. I think it came out well for my first time. Hello 2011!

Close but No Absolution - 2010 in Review

2011-01-07T12:48:00.014-06:00

"I cant believe another year has gone by

And still nothing, as if we dont even try

And theres nothing to be proud of

And nothing you can truly stand by

Its time to believe!" - Chain of Strength

I started off 2010 with some ambitious goals (though less ambitious than year's past) and I fell short. My most important goal was to get the Angels of Absolution to 2000 points of fully painted models. I started the year out at around 1500 points. I launched out of the gate early on, completing a couple of key models like a Devastator Veteran Sergeant and a Dreadnought, but the rest of this year's completions for the Angels were 4 counters, my first Scout, and one Tactical Marine for a brand new squad. It was a strong start to 2010 but a weak finish.

Other goals I intended to complete were:

- Get my Tomb Kings to 2000 points fully painted. This army was completely untouched throughout 2010.

- Complete the Ork Trukk I've been working on since 2008. I tried really hard in the last week of 2010 to at least accomplish this goal. I still failed. I also wasn't supposed to work on any other Ork projects in 2010, and instead I completed 3 models for the army - 2 Trukk Boyz and a Scavvie Slave (counts as a Grot).

- Complete my Humboldt Park/Chicago themed board. I didn't get this done but I made some solid progress. In October I posted some close ups of little details. I really want to go crazy on the detail and flexibility of this game table so I'm okay with the fact that this was left incomplete.

- Not listed last January but I was supposed to paint a bunch of models for my buddy Mike. The Blood Angels Dreadnought in the above photo was one of those models. I had like 4 character models I needed to paint as well. Fail. Fail. Fail. And fail.

My final failing was that Scott and I had a painting competition to see who could get the most models done despite our demanding schedules and snail like painting pace. I felt like I was setting the pace for the first several months but as my dad always told me, "Those who run fast don't run long." Sure enough, I got busy and lost all my steam. With the final model I am posting today, I completed 18 painting points worth of models - 2 Dreadnoughts, 6 infantry models, and 4 counters -compared to his 37 painting points.

Strangely, despite being doubled I sort of consider it a success. I feel like I accomplished more in 2010 than I did in 2009, and that's really what it's all about. Conversely, Scott only tied his previous year's output. In my eyes, this made the competition a success and I'm practically begging him to do it again this year!

So lets talk about my goals for 2011! This year rather than setting point totals I'm going to do something a little more suited to my own sense of accomplishment which comes from my display case and how full it is with completed models. In that spirit here are my goals. (Please note that for purposes of these goals a vehicle counts as 4 models.)

- Shelf I & II. Angels of Absolution (DA): I intend to complete 5 models of any type.

- Shelf III. Redemptors of Golinar (IG): I intend to complete 10 models of any type.

- Shelf IV. Bloody Fist Orks (Ork): I intend to complete the Ork Trukk plus 5 models of any type.

- Shelf V. Tomb Kings of Khemri (TK): I intend to complete 5 models of any type.

- Shelf VI. Marienburger Mercenaries (Emp): I intend to complete no less than 25 models.

Some people can complete this many models in their sleep. For me it is very ambitious. The most important things I have on my side are the visual driver that makes me want to fill the display cases I own, the small targets for each army that allow me to jump around with my project ADD, and (hopefully) a little bit of competitive spirit between Scott and I.

Also, it isn't reflected in my goals above, but Scott and I are both striving to have 1000 points painted of our respective Empire (me) and Skaven (Scott). With my hodge podge approach to getting armies on the table, 25 models could still end up being 1000 points with characters and war machines.

Fiinally, I noticed that our blog output dropped from 2009 to 2010. I'd like to put forth a challenge to the rest of the 2nd City Warzone crew - let's strive to have 50 posts this year - just under one a week on average. We can do it. Who's with me?

Mechanicus Knights (aka Sentinels for my AdMech Guard Army)

2011-01-05T14:27:00.010-06:00

Hey again,
Just finished up a couple more Knights for my AdMech Guard army... The first one not really super proud of.. had grand ideas when first gathering together the different bits.. but it really didn't turn out like I wanted it too and don't really want to spend any more time on it. Gonna be one of those models that sits on the shelf i think.. but anyhow it was a fun conversion attempt.. The bits used where Legs from the old metal IG Sentinel.. the body was a combination of the super old Space Marine Landspeeder and a new IG Sentinel... the top turret is bits from the new IG Sentinel and some weird mechanicus double melta tripod thing...

Next up is one of my regular Knights, this one armed with lascannons and as of right now, no extra armor, need to dig through my Chimera bits box for more of the track cover pieces (totally forgot about adding those til i just took the picts.. doh!!!)

2011 is starting off to be pretty productive.. now if i could only find people to play with...
-Brose

Crimson Fists Mechanicus Sternguard...

2010-12-30T12:17:00.013-06:00

Hey all, well my work recently bought me a new Nokia N8 phone with a 12 Megapixal camera (with macro!!!!) So will finally be able to post decent pictures again... Starting with this blog. I recently posted a 2000pt list for an upcoming tournament where i will be using a Master of the Forge and a Thunderfire Cannon in my Crimson Fists army... I have tons of Bionic bits left over from (MaxMini) from my Guard Mechanicus Army, so I was like, I think it would be cool to try and add a bit more AdMech bits to my fists army. I mean after the all the destruction on Rynn's World, the fists numbers have been reduced... so my thoughts with are this.. Most (if not all?) Chapters send Marines to Mars to be trained as tech priest.. so Pedro sent out a call for all these guys to come back home asap. Agree???
Anyways, I have to say, my only minor complaint with the MaxMini Boinic Bits are there are only 1 set of legs and 1 set of arms and while they are completely awesome, i decided it would make it kinda tough to make a whole 10 man tactical squad look slightly dynamic without tons of cutting em up and pinning/green stuffing them back together.. looking at my list, i have a 6 man Sternguard squad, so decided to just try a go at them first. So without further ado, here is are my conversions...
First up, a group shot of the six

now just close up's of the six...

(this ones a bit blurry but eh...)

and on that note.. that is my last project of 2010... looking forward to finishing up my AdMech Guard Army next year for sure!!!
Happy New Year All!!!!
-Brose

The Horrors... The Horrors...

2010-12-20T09:18:00.000-06:00

I finished this unit of pink/ blue horrors.

I have to say, these new plastic horrors are a joy to paint. I wasn't crazy about them when they were first released, but painting them has won me over. I mean, look at this face:

Anyway, I like them more now that I've painted them. They're certainly not perfect and there are things I like about the last edition ones better (I'll cover more on this in a future post).

This unit is actually a mix of old and new horrors.

First here are more pictures of the new plastic horrors.

I really like painting jewels.

Icon bearer.

"Champion"

While I do like these new models, I own quite a few of the old metal ones. I really didn't want let them go to waste. Since they're so much smaller, I decided to paint them as blue horrors.

With each of these blue horrors, I painted one set of arms and half the their bodies pink. I wanted to show that each of these blue horrors used to be half a pink horror. So two of the horrors are pink on their right and two are pink on their left.

Besides the size, one of the differences with the new horrors is that they have a lot of "bling". I sculpted a little be of jewelery on to two of them.

Here is one more group shot.

This is a pretty important milestone. I now have painted as many miniatures as I did last year: 32 (Though I have 37 points in the painting race due to the way it's scored). I was really hoping to beat my total from last year, but that's looking less and less likely.

Master of the Forge with Conversion Beamer on Bike

2010-12-19T14:47:00.004-06:00

Hey,
So here is my Master of the Forge with a Conversion Beamer on a bike for the up coming Conquest NW Tournament... pretty happy with the conversions here.. the bike is a RT/2nd Edition Marine Jet bike that was carrying a Chaplain... The conversion beamer is a piece of the Imperial Bastian

Holidays are coming and i am going to buy myself a real camera, so next set of photo's will be nice I promise...
-Eric

Conquest NW....

2010-12-07T11:58:00.008-06:00

Hey all... been pretty quiet here lately.... whats going on guys??? Personally, i've been all over the place and haven't had alot of time to do much of anything hobby related. Still chugging away at my AdMech Guard and I know scott has some newly painted daemons coming up soon, so stay tuned! In the meantime... thought i would post my list for the upcoming Conquest NW 2000 point 40k tournament and try and get some comments/thoughts/suggestions. Planning on adding 2 units i haven't used at all, and hoping to actually find someone to game with so i can test em out... Here we go,

HQ
Master Of The Forge
Conversion Beamer, Bike

Pedro Kantor
Honor Guard x5
3x Relic Blades, RazorBack (Heavy Bolter)

TROOPS
Tactical Squad x10
PowerFist, MeltaGun, Missile Launcher, Rhino

Tactical Squad x10
PowerFist, MeltaGun, Missile Launcher, Rhino

ELITE
Assault Terminators x5
x3 ThunderHammer/StormShield
LandRaider Crusader MultiMelta

SternGuard x6
x3 CombiMelta, Powerfist, RazorBack (Heavy Bolter)

HEAVY
Thunderfire Cannon

Devastator Squad x5
x3 Missile Launcher

The two units i haven't played are the Master of the Forge (MotF) and the Thunderfire Cannon.. My plan is to keep the MotF out of way and as far away (>48 inches if possible) from everything and try and pound away with those Strength 10 Blast shots from the beamer. Probably put the Cannon in some cover and do the same. Also not sure if i should ditch the Dev squad and add another Termie and maybe a sternguard or two... Also, Pedro with the honor guard is a great hard hitting unit that alot of people seem to ignore as i usually keep them back any let them support any troops that get in trouble.... Thoughts?

Todays Conversion

2010-11-04T19:57:00.003-05:00

Ever seen a Servitor run so fast....

or as someone else just pointed out... the plasma rifle has not been very good to him ;)

Hyspasists Continued..

2010-10-30T14:40:00.010-05:00

Hey all,
In my last post i mentioned that i was going to try and make some conversions out of the Wargames Factory Greatcoat Shock Troopers and turn them into my foot slogging Mechanicus guard... When i first saw photo's of these guys i was totally stoked and then i saw the price.. which was 18 models for round $25, which i though was great... until i actually got them... there are only 3 poses available, two of which are actually really good and the other very static... But overall i felt with a little bit of green stuff and some other various bits I could make em pretty good. I still lack a decent camera, so as always, please forgive the photo's taken from my HTC Hero.. (which is great at taking photos of normal everyday things, but not so great taking close-ups of minis!)
So first up is a couple photos of my first couple test minis

Here are a couple shots of my first 4 all together... pretty cohesive I think?

Lastly, i recently bought some of the bionic bits from MaxMini and converted some of my veterans using these bits.. pretty cool i think.
This one has the bionic leg...

Here are a couple with bionic arms..

Thats it for this rainy saturday morning!
Cheers,
Eric

I liked the pretty colors...

2010-10-08T23:47:00.010-05:00

A year or so ago, the owner of my FLGS ran a demo of a game called Heavy Gear: Blitz for me. It's a 12mm sci-fi game set on a distant planet. The rules, while quite simple, are extremely complex... Let me rephrase, there are a lot of rules... they aren't difficult to understand, it's just difficult to remember all of them.

I picked the army that had the coolest looking color scheme, and since I'm not big on the whole walking robots schtick, I chose a force that had a lot of tanks and infantry; namely, Port Arthur Korps (PAK). They are the remnants of an earth force that landed on Terra Nova (the planet that the game takes place on) and have some of the more advanced technology in the game... Including the dreaded heavy hover tanks that seem to be nearly unstoppable in the game (they're the bigger ones in the pictures)

I finished my force up about a month or two ago, but I never got around to taking decent pictures of them.

All said; it's about 3300 "threat value" (basically, points). We usually play at 1000 or 1500, so this is way more points than I'd ever generally play.

I still haven't tried the light hover tanks in a game (the two smaller tank squads of 3 each), but I figured that I had to have a couple of squads of them to round things out.

I'm pretty happy with how the army came out, and I really enjoy playing the game.

Some Day My (Daemon) Prince Will Come....

2010-10-06T13:00:00.000-05:00

Actually, he's here. Here are pictures to prove it.

This is a standard plastic Daemon prince with a couple small conversions. I liked the left hand, but thought it looked like it should be holding something. I created the fireball out of a large spawn eye, dryad limbs, and green stuff.

I also used a small spawn eye to make this third eye. This prince will be dedicated to Tzeentch and I thought the third "mystical" eye was a good way to show that.

I also painted the armor in Thousand Sons colors. However, my Sons are undercoated in black and the prince is undercoated in white. As a consequence, the armor is a lot lighter than my other Thousand Sons. No biggie, I guess.

Here is a rear shot.

Here is a shot of the base before I mounted the mini. As you can see, it has a Rhino door from everyone favorite Dark Angels successor chapter, the Angels of Absolution (Thanks for the painting tutorial, Nick)

Finally, here is a close up of the daemon face on the right arm.

Enjoy.

Hyspasists

2010-10-04T15:59:00.005-05:00

Hey, got some more WIP skitarii photos for you today... So most have probably seen my veteran skitarii conversions based on Space Marine Scouts, if not go back a to the archive and check em out. These have been coming along nicely and i now have 3 full 10 man veteran squads with Chimeras. I also decided I wanted to be able to run regular troops (Hyspasists) too, so traded some stuff recently for some IG. I've seen lots of other folks conversions using high elf archers for the robed look, but i was never really stoked on how they looked, so decided to try and make the cloaks myself with some green stuff. I am very much a newbie with actual sculpting, but i like it and feel that with each model i get a bit better, not completely satisfied with these models, but i think they will be alright when surrounded by the rest of my army. So with out further ado, here are a couple picts

so, now that i've got a squad of 10 of these guys in various states of modeling, i found these guys on the interwebs the other day and ordered a box immediately. i think these are gonna be the ones I end up using... just some small conversions needed to get em looking good me thinks.
wargamesfactory shock troops

Close Ups from Recent Projects

2010-10-01T12:58:00.003-05:00

NickxBaran here. I've been really quiet as of late. I was feverishly competing with Scott back in the spring to get the most models painted this year, and though he has a firm lead, the dream is not dead. However, I haven't touched a model from any of my armies in months. To get back in the swing of things I've been focusing on one of my ongoing terrain projects. Everything is still a work in progress in my head so rather than present the broad project, I figured I'd just give you all pics of some of the little details for now. Check back in a few days for more shots.

AdMech Commissars

2010-09-06T23:47:00.013-05:00

Hey all, been away too long. Just actually moved to back to my home town of seattle, so models haven't been a priority til this week. As some of you may know, I've been slowly working on a Mechanicus (counts as guard) army for close to 6 months now off and on. Still haven't played a game with em yet either!!! and also have yet to find anyone to play with in Seattle... any takers? I kinda neglected posting here for a while and instead spent some time posting at BoLS... but finally am back! You can check out that thread here , it has a bunch of my more recent conversions. I don't have a decent camera at the moment either so the only photo I am posting today is some cool conversion (IMO) of two old metal Steel Legion models into AdMech Commissars. Both models have been heavily converted and green stuff'd and I have to say, im stoked at how they turned out (the photo does not do them justice!)

just for show.. the original model for the one converted commissar on the left is this one

and the one on the right is from this one

finally, not sure where that model is from in the back.. but was originally going to play him as an inquisitor but who knows what the status of allies will be in the future....

as promised here are a couple more crappy camera photos of the commissars themselves...

On another note, i've just joined the 40k Nerd Tattoo regiment with this newest addition to my tattoo's...

The Eldar go to WAR!!!!

2010-08-28T12:44:00.002-05:00

There is a Grand Tournament only an hour away from me in November. It is Da Boyz GT and info can be found here http://daboyzgt.wordpress.com/da-boyz-gt/. I have decided to use my Eldar, since they won a tournament last month and going to a tourney that grades painting, will make me touch the army up. I will include some pictures soon, including my scorpian/swooping hawk/shinning spear autarch on jetbike. I thought i'd put up my army list first. I am trying to go for a good composition score, so the only things that i have 2 of is wave serpents and autarchs. I figure this is almost like a training force, almost all guardians(including drivers) except for a token Dire Avenger "recruiter" squad and the two autarchs. I will be working on story and a display board for the army. Winner of the tourney gets a free bid at The GT in Vegas, plus an eldar titan!!!!

Autarch on jetbike, laser lance, madiblasters (leads jetbikes) - 130
Autarch on foot, madiblasters, power weapon, fusion gun (leads storm guardians) - 100

10 Storm Guardians, 2 fusion guns, warlock, enhance - 132
in Wave serpent, shuriken cannon, twin linked missle launchers, spirit stones - 140

10 guardians, missle launcher, warlock, singing spear, destructor - 238
in Wave serpent, shuriken cannon, twin linked bright lances, spirit stones - 155

6 jetbikes, 2 shuriken cannons, warlock, singing spear, embolden - 205

5 dire avengers (1 exarch, diresword) rides in the Falcon - 82

3 vypers 3 missle launchers, 3 shuriken cannons - 225

Nightspinner, surriken cannon, Holofields, Spirit Stones -170

Fireprism, surriken cannon, Holofields, Spirit Stones - 170

Falocn, Bright Lance, surriken cannon, Holofields, Spirit Stones - 200

1847/1850 total

The idea is that I will try to get 2nd turn every game and keep everything in reserve. The Autarchs will let me arrive on a 2+ on turn 2. I will come in where the enemy is weakest and hopefully outside of the range of his big guns. This will force them to move losing more turns of shooting. I have 4 scoring units and the Dire Avengers are mostly there to make the Falcon scoring. Though I have killed big things before with the Diresword. It's a great FU to something big and scary. I appreciate any comments

Terrain whirlwind...

2010-08-16T18:24:00.004-05:00

So I have had these old Crusader 29 resin walls sitting around for... maybe 2 years now. In an effort to make my pile of useless junk more useful, I have decided to go through and do a project every few nights... I've gotten pretty quick with an airbrush, and I did these two buildings start-to-finish yesterday evening. I think they came out pretty well considering that they both only took me a few hours...

I don't know what I'll end up using these for, but they seem ideal for any sort of medieval or Roman battles. Maybe this will get me motivated to paint some models to put inside of them.

I'll be posting some more stuff in the near future, just wanted everyone to know that I'm still alive and kicking (and I have a lot of new stuff painted)!

Let's Flame Again!!

2010-08-02T13:00:00.001-05:00

... Like we did last fall.

So here are more flamers.

These miniatures are from my backlog of models that I started and never finished. From what I can tell, I painted the base coats with a Q-tip. Not only that, but I primed two of them them with guesso (You can read more about me complaining about guesso here).

Point is, this paint I was painting over was very rough and blotchy. It took a lot of work to get them to look more or less smooth.

With my previous batch of Flamers, I was going for an almost mono-chromatic look. This time I wanted to add more contrast, so I painted the teeth brown. Also, to distinguish them from the other unit, I painted the "hands" purple.

I'm my own worse critic, so I won't say much more other than they're ready for the tabletop.

New plastic horrors and the long awaited Daemon prince are coming out on Saturday, and I'm hoping to get them the day they come out. Not sure what I'm going to work on in the meantime.

Herald of Slaanesh

2010-07-05T08:30:00.003-05:00

I just finished a Herald of Slaanesh. I had realized that I have no HQ units for my Daemon army. This was a pretty easy conversion and a quick paint job.

I thought it would be cool to basically reverse the color scheme on had used on the Daemonette unit. So instead of blue skin with gold armor, I painted yellow (gold) skin with silver (with a blue undertone) armor.

I can't say I'm 100% happy. Yellow is a hard color and I'm a sloppy painter. Then again, since I'm trying to focus on getting models on the table, it's fine for now.

Chaos Space Marines

2010-06-22T07:02:00.006-05:00

I just finished these five chaos space marines. The unit is eventually going to have 10 guys, but I can only stand to paint 5 at a time.

I really agonized for a long time about this paint job. I wanted something that was quick to paint. After trying several recipes, I settled on a base of Adeptus Battlegrey. The shading was Delvan Mud and Badab Black with some highlights of Codex Grey.

Now that I'm settled on a formula, I'm hoping to bang the rest of the unit out pretty quickly.

These Marine are from my chapter, The Sentinels of Truth. I want them to represent a chapter that has recently gone renegade which is why they're a mix of loyalist and Chaos parts.

They don't have a chapter badge. The shoulder pad that would have that is bare metal. They leave that left shoulder bare to represent their fallen status.

However, I did paint some symbols on them. I call this squad "Bastion squad" so I painted some castles on a couple of them. I also painted an eye on one of them to represent their alliance with my Thousand Sons force.

Expect more of these soon. Hopefully much faster.

In Other News...

A congratulations are in order to our very own Matt Weeks. Matt and his wife are now the proud parents of a beutiful baby girl. Edda Elanor Weeks born June 10th. Everyone is doing great.

Congratulations!

mechanicus WIP at BoLS

2010-05-16T19:56:00.004-05:00

don't want to double post... so here is some of my recent Mechanicus WIP army that i just posted at BoLS.
Enjoy!
http://www.lounge.belloflostsouls.net/showthread.php?p=75686&posted=1#post75686

Snapshots from the Warzone

2010-05-14T08:14:00.003-05:00

These are all snapshots from a recent game between Eric and I. I think I managed to capture some cool pictures, so here they are. I was thinking I might submit one to BoLS for their daily Gallery post. Any suggestions?

The Return of Gorgog Smashskul

2010-05-10T13:55:00.004-05:00

Sometimes, when a set of options in your Codex really suck, you let a model fall into disuse. This exact thing happened to my Warboss, Gorgog Smashskul. To deepen his shame, his choppa arm had busted off and he had gotten all chipped up. He had remained dormant, broken and degraded in a storage case for at least 2 years. Luckily, as I rummaged through projects to work on I decided to get him back into display case shape. Some repairs and some touch ups last week got him back in order. I would like to go back and redo his eyes. Even in this distant shot I can tell his eyes are kind of piss poor. I'll try and get to that this week just because. Gorgog and the model directly next to him were both painted roughly 10 years ago. The Ork Boy was another repair needly sitting storage.

Last week, I didn't just work on repairing broken models though. Here are 2 brand new Ork Trukk Boys that I completed.
Both of these models have some very subtle conversions. If you look closely at the choppa arm of the model on the right you will see a plastic Ork glyph that I shaved off of a Slugga or something and glued onto the arm band.
In the picks above and below you can see I added 3 large rivets onto the top of his helmet to make him look a little more unique. As far as his paint job goes, I'm really stoked on his piercing eyes and the dags on his pant leg.
In the below picture you can see that I used a tiny bit of plastic tubing to extend the barrel of this Ork's slugga. I also glued a glyph plate on his back. Many of my Trukk Boys have bitz on them that would be suitable for making emergency repairs.

This final image is of a Scavvy from Necromunda. I have long used them as the Grots manning my Big Gunz because I don't have enough Grots to go around. This particular model was sitting in the storage case without its base done for at least 7-8 years. I figured it was time to finish him off and get him in the display case as well.

Models completed last week towards the painting challenge: 3 (2 Ork Boyz and 1 Scavvy).

Nick: 17 pts

Scott: 14 pts

Later this week I'll post some images from a game I played against Eric's Death Guard army.

Derg Corra Amnon: Chaos Sorcerer

2010-05-03T12:09:00.000-05:00

My chaos sorcerer is finally done. It's on a 40mm base, so technically, I should only get 2 points for the painting race. However, Nick said he thinks this miniature deserves more.

Therefore, I earn 3 points and Nick and I are tied.

Here are some more pictures.

I haven't seal it yet, so it looks very shiny. Also, there are some touch-ups I'd like to do (particularly the halberd), but don't want to get too bogged down in one miniature. I'll do the touch-ups soon, but I need a break for a couple days from this mini.

Also, there are in-progress shots along with more detailed pictures of the base on my personal blog.

Progress Comes Slowly...

2010-04-27T15:54:00.005-05:00

A few weeks back I posted the Blood Angels dreadnought that I had roughly completed for Adepticon (actually a couple of days after.) Since Adepticon I returned to my painting table and really wanted to drop a bomb on Scott. I had a firm lead in our painting competition and he promptly smothered me with his 11 point Daemon unit. My Blood Angels' dread reduced that lead somewhat, but I really needed to make up some ground. Luckily I've been stockpiling!

Today I'm striking back hard by dropping 6 more points. I'm hitting back with 3 Angels of Absolution models - a Dreadnought, a Devastator Squad Sergeant, and a Counter.

Sergeant 0f the 9th Devastator Squad of the Fifth Company:

Side view to get a good shot of his squad marking.

Hidden Set-Up Counter #4

Eros of the Fifth Company, originally of the 5th Tactical Squad before interment. Still frequently acting in support of them as if he never left.

Close Up of the little bit of weathering I did on the legs.

Nick: 14

Scott: 11

But I already know Scott has 3 more points dropping any day now. Time to step it up.

More Crimson Fists...

2010-04-19T22:43:00.004-05:00

Hey all. Its been a quite time on the blog since adepticon... haven't even gotten in a game yet (but hope to remedy that asap!) I've mainly been working on my new Mechanicus army and haven't really gotten anything photo ready, but i've just about finished my first squad, so soon. In the meantime though... the following pictures are from a couple of 95% complete projects that have also been on my plate for a while now. First up, six veteran marines... most likely will be played as Pedro's honor guard. Highlighting is a bit rough still and just primed the back packs this weekend, so still some work to go, but overall im pretty happy with em. I think they'll do very nicely inside a landraider with Pedro. actually will probably try and do up 4 more, just to make it a nice point sink...

Next up... a red scorpion forgeworld dread that i got last year at adepticon and (sadly) defiled it to make a Crimson Fists venerable dread. This one i'd say is about 99% done. Just need to touch up a couple highlights and i'll be pretty stoked on it. The one thing Im not really that excited about was, my attempt at a modified chainfist... i thought that it would look so cool to convert 4 chainswords (as claws) into a chainfist and perhaps with some better sculpting, it would look awesome.. but mine... eh mediocre at best.

Anyhow.. i've got grandiose plans for my up and coming mechanicus project... (ebay bids left and right) so stay tuned!
-Brose

mechanicus skitarii

2010-04-02T08:12:00.005-05:00

hey all...
well usually after adepticon i don't touch a paint brush for weeks, but some reason (probably all the amazing models and armies that were displayed there) i still have some inspiration. One of the 'themes' that has always intrigued me was the Mechanicus (even though i did not see any armies like this this year) Especially after reading Dark Mechanicus and Titanicus. After many a google search and seeing other peoples conversion ideas, one in particular caught my attention for the basic mechanicus troop (Skitarii). So without further ado... here is my first attempt at a conversion. Basically all it so far, is an older metal scout, with some green stuff added. Will probably add some guitar string wires that go out of the head and straight to the gun.. something like an advanced targeting array or something. but for now here are my first blurry pictures..

Please forgive the shoulder pad cog... it looks quite silly right now, but I am working on a greenstuff mold/stamp that i will be able to mass produce the shoulder pad cogs/skulls.
Anyhow, late for work once again, so its time for me to head out!
ps.. I have also have 8 Crimson Fist honor guard that are near completion, will be posting more blurry pictures soon!
-brose

More Adepticon Coverage

2010-03-31T10:00:00.000-05:00

Unlike most attendees to Adepticon, I tend to not take a lot of pictures of armies. I realize that their are a lot of people out there doing that who are doing a much better job of it (For example).

I tend to take picture of friends I don't to get to see as much as I like. For example, my buddy General Baggy in the picture above.

Here I am discussing gaming with Aaron (of Xenite's Little Green Monsters) and Felix (of Pokeminiatures).

Here Dave (Rabid Bat Studio and Gorgon Miniatures) watches over the Vox Populi board.

Our very own Matt Weeks creates order out of chaos.

Here the 2nd City Team (Eric Brose and Nick Baran)prepares for war in Saturday's team tournament.

I did take a few pictures of miniatures, like the ones below.

I was impressed at how many Fortresses of Redemption this particular group of tables had.

I also had the opportunity to play on Matt's famous Epic table with Anton's massive imperial guard army (I got to control three titans!)

I also took my son, Max with me this year. Unfortunately, he was deemed a heretic and captured by this sister of battle. Although, she's not a very good sister of battle if she thinks he's the heretical one.

Over all, this was one of the best Adepticons I've been a part of. I think this has to do with the fact that I volunteered this year. It's so much more rewarding to actually help make the convention the great time it was.

As is typical of the days after Adepticon, I'm already thinking about next year.

My One Adepticon Accomplishment

2010-03-30T12:13:00.005-05:00

This year we at 2nd City Warzone attempted to go as simplistic as possible for the 2010 40K Team Tournament. We elected to use Buffalo, NY Battle-Brother Mike Nogle's Blood Angels' 5th Company as our tournament force. His force was already largely painted and based in a cohesive scheme - though there were a few models that needed to be put together last minute. About 3 weeks ahead of time I got a package in the mail from Buffalo that included the full force I would be playing with along with this unpainted Furioso Dreadnought conversion:
This gave me what would seem like plenty of time to get this model done. However, at the zero hour the tactical markings still weren't done. In the two days since Adepticon 2010 I finally completed the tactical markings. So that you know, the model was actually primed with Skull White Primer, and then coated again with Blood Angels Red Spray - now long out of print. The metal bits of the legs were coated with Boltgun Metal Spray - also out of print. The sharpest highlights were done with Bronzed Flesh in order to slightly mute the orange factor slightly. I think it worked out really well.

5th Company Marking.
Blood Angels Chapter Insignia.

Enoch. First Dreadnought of the Fifth Company - Former Tactical Trooper before interment.

Oh yeah - and this should net me 4 more points in the Painting Race with Scott. Too bad he doesn'd get to stay in my display case. haha.

Adepticon Photostream

2010-03-30T11:55:00.004-05:00

Hey all,
This years Adepticon was by far the funnest I've been too (this was year 4). Even though most of my results were Mediocre at best, the opponents I face were some of friendliest I've ever played against. Still recovering from a fuzzy head (from too many dice rolls and bourbon!) and not nearly enough sleep! Will try and get together a summary soon, but in the mean time, here is photostream of some of the armies I faced

Flicr Photo set

ps some of the photos are pretty damn blurry and for that I apologize!
Enjoy
-Brose

Today is officially adepticon post day

2010-03-24T18:22:00.004-05:00

So here are my Combat Patrol and Championship Armies..
First off my CP list.

Troops: Scout Squad #1
4 Scout Squad Bolt Pistol x4; Combat Blade x4
1 Sergeant Bolt Pistol; Power Fist

Fast Attack: Land Speeder Storm #1
1 Land Speeder Storm Multi-Melta

Troops: Scout Squad #2
4 Scout Squad Bolt Pistol x4; Combat Blade x4
1 Sergeant Bolt Pistol; Power Weapon

Fast Attack: Land Speeder Storm #2
1 Land Speeder Storm Heavy Flamer

Troops: Scout Squad #3
4 Scout Squad Bolt Pistol x4; Sniper Rifle x3; Missile Launcher
1 Sergeant Bolt Pistol; Sniper Rifle

Thoughts are... Squad 1 are my disposable, in your face first turn hopefully taking out a vehicle or 2 with Powerfist/Melta combo (with scout move). Squad #3, hide in cover, lay down suppressive fire, hustle if necessary to last minute objective grab/contest. Squad #2 is reactionary with flamer and Powersword, staying in the back for last minute objective grab/contest.

And here they are...

ps as you may have seen in my previous posts... the landspeeder storm scouts are all completely magnetized so they can hop in and out of the speeders at will.

Championship 1850 List

HQ: Chapter Master Pedro Kantor Iron Halo; Power Armour; Dorn's Arrow; Power Fist

Elite: Terminator Assault Squad
6 Terminator Assault Squad Lightning Claws (pair) x3; Thunder Hammer & Storm Shield x3;
1 Sergeant Lightning Claws (pair) x1

1 Land Raider Crusader
Multi-Melta; Hurricane Bolter x2; Twin Linked Assault Cannon

Elite: Sternguard Veteran Squad
5 Sternguard Veteran Squad Bolter x5
1 Sergeant Bolter; Power Fist
1 Razorback Twin Linked Heavy Bolter

Elite: Sternguard Veteran Squad
5 Sternguard Veteran Squad Bolter x5
1 Sergeant Combi-Meltagun; Power Fist
1 Razorback Twin Linked Heavy Bolter

Troops: Tactical Squad
9 Tactical Squad Bolter x7; Meltagun; Lascannon
1 Sergeant Bolter; Power Fist
1 Rhino Storm Bolter

Troops: Tactical Squad
9 Tactical Squad Bolt Bolter x7; Meltagun; Lascannon
1 Sergeant Bolter; Power Fist
1 Rhino Storm Bolter

Heavy Support: Predator
1 Predator Twin Linked Lascannon; Heavy Bolter Sponsons

Heavy Support: Predator
1 Predator Twin Linked Lascannon; Heavy Bolter Sponsons

Thoughts are... Pedro and Termies are in your face, with Sternguard/Razorback there to provide support. Both tactical squads stay back in rhinos firing lascannon shots and provide cover for predators (which also just sit back and fire preferably hull down). towards the end of the game, tactical squads move towards objectives. If the mission is annihilation, everyone stays together and makes the enemy come to me!

and here they are...

less than 2 days and still need to paint 5 death company for the team tournie and build display boards for (which I am off to do now).

The Darkside of AdeptiCon

2010-03-24T16:43:00.004-05:00

On top of planning AdeptiCon, starting a new job this year, expecting a child this summer, and trying to get a fledgling game company off the ground - I also decided it would be a good idea to demo a skirmish game I have been working on at AdeptiCon. This is a brief introduction to the game written by Dave Pauwels:

Vox Populi takes place in the sprawling city of Republic Rome. The year is 44 BC and Rome has become a tumultuous place. Different factions within the Roman government vie for control of the masses. On one side, Caesar uses his popularity, won on the battlefields of Gaul, to manipulate public opinion. On the other side, the Senate, fearful of Caesar’s growing popularity, attempts to block his every move.

But the Palantine Hill isn’t the only battleground. In the cobblestone streets of the Subura, Rome’s poorer district, different interests are at work. Slave-traders and criminal networks recruit from Rome’s poor, while slave revolts become almost daily events. Rabble-rousing politicians find themselves at odds with unscrupulous merchants. Every corner of Rome’s slums becomes a potential battlefield.

This is the setting for Vox Populi, a city on the brink of tearing itself apart. Even now, rumors of Caesar crossing the Rubicon spread like wildfire throughout the city. It is a desperate time and everyone is forced, finally, to choose a side…

The original plan was to set a reasonable deadline and force me to get everything in order and ready for playtesting. I soon found that this added burden was both a curse and a blessing. As AdeptiCon planning and preparation reached breakneck pace, I suddenly found myself needing to finish writing playtest rules, build/paint two factions and build a table. I can speak from experience...Rome was not built in a day.

While this perhaps was a bit much, in the end I accomplished everything I was hoping to. We are now a mere 36 hours away from the start of a massive wargaming weekend and I am very eager to see this game in action and hear some feedback from outside our small group of playtesters. Dave Pauwels was kind enough to paint up 13 or so Roman characters, slaves, plebs and the like. I haven't even seen them yet - but I am sure they are fantastic. I have one final roof section to complete this evening and the table will be complete. Here are a few WIP photos of the table:

After AdeptiCon, I hope to make some revisions to the rules, add some details to the table and prep the demo for some action at Little Wars. Vox Populi demos will be taking place Friday evening and Sunday afternoon in the the Specialist Games Hall (Lilac).

Scott's Short Road to Adepticon

2010-03-24T10:36:00.007-05:00

This Friday I'll be heading to Adepticon. I don't have much planned besides working as a judge for the Team Tournament on Saturday. You'll see me walking around Saturday with a clipboard and (hopefully) a big sash that says "Judge".

Other than that, I have no other commitments. Ideally, I'll see a lot of people I don't get to see very often and do some hanging out.

I will definitely be at the Friday night Bits Swap. I've done the Saturday night Bits Swap several times, but from what I hear, the Friday night one blows it out of the water. This is the first time I'll be at Adepticon on a Friday night, so I am doing some prep work for the that. I've made a list of bits I'm seeking and their corresponding prices on BW Bits.

One has to be prepared for these things as to not get ripped off.

Also, a couple years back, I posted a picture of myself right before Adepticon and said something like, "this is what I look like, so say hi if you see me." It was more or less a joke, but people actually came up to me and said they recognized me.

So I figured, I'd do it again this year. Here's me in a Tauntaun sleeping bag (no, it's not mine). If you see me, say hello.

Preparing For Adpeticon 1

2010-03-12T09:30:00.004-06:00

Hey all,
So been working on getting my Combat Patrol and Championship lists ready for this years adepticon. Will be playing my Crimson Fists for both and am totally not ready!!! but I woke up late this morning and decided since im late i might as well make being late worth while. So finished up the highlights my first Drop Pod. So without further ado....

will be posting more pictures as both lists progress... yes I know i have less than 2 weeks to finsih... don't remind me!!!
-brose

Put it on the Board! Deamonettes Done.

2010-03-04T12:06:00.001-06:00

This unit is done. I will never paint 11 miniatures at the same time. I think 5-6 is the ideal number I can do at once. otherwise, I get bored.

Anyway, this unit is done. It's an 11 strong unit so that with the Herald it will have 12 models (2x Slaanesh's sacred number of 6)

I'm really happy with the icon as well.

What I'm not happy with is the fact that I'm still struggling with using this camera. I really just need to set aside to learn it top to bottom.

In other news, Like Nick, I have resurrected my old blog. I miss posting in-progress shots, so I'll be putting those up there along with whatever random crap that doesn't fit the polished image of 2nd City Warzone.

Nick: 4
Scott: 11