Project: Gothic City Board

Our FLGS has lots of space and tables but a limited set of good terrain and the game groups has been growing. So this is a good excuse to jumping to a new project. I picked up 3 sets of Gothic City Buildings from Pegasus Hobby. Amazon had a deal for 3 sets for about $70. Here are the sets I got.

• Gothic City Building Large Miniature Terrain Set
• Gothic City Building Ruins Set 1
• Gothic City Building Small 2

Pegasus Hobby kits are good. Each kit comes with interchangeable wall sections that let you make lots of different configurations of buildings. These wall segments snap together so you can try out different configurations before you glue them together or leave them interchangeable. For fun I put all the wall sections into one huge 6 story building, totally awesome. For this project I want to make static building on MDF but more about that in a sec. The only issues is that the fit is not perfect so fitting them together can take some force and the tends to 'pop' apart. My guess is this will make construction a challenge when I get them to a board.
The kits are very generous especially for the price. The Building Large set has enough wall sections to fill out the other two kits into larger buildings and create another building. It gave me enough structure for 4 good sized 2 story buildings. The ruined wall sections from Building Ruins Set 1 as a little limiting unless you do some wall damage on your own. But again, this is by far the best system I have seen.



My goals are

• Dense terrain lots of cover
• Rugged construction
• Lots of rubble and built up defensive positions
• Well modeled details that are fun to look at

In addition, I had some old Forge World defensive lines that I will be adding in to the board terrain. My plan is to go through all the odds and ends I have and really making the board chunky.

Khorne berserker test paint

I have been playing around with making a small Chaos Space Marine army. The long and short of it is I want to paint something bright. If you have been watching my Flickr feed you may have spotted Typhus. There is still some clean up to do, but here is the Khorne berserker test paint. Yes that is very red.

Project: Imperial Fists, milestone 2000+ points painted

Not really much to say, after a long night of painting and weathering. I now have 2000 points in painted Imperial Fists. I have a couple of thing left to do before I am ready for War Con, but if I had to drop the army in the car and go it is ready. Now the focus is on doing the last couple of things that can raise my painting score and finish the dozer blades. But enough about that on with the pictures!



The whole force in all it's glory. I am happy with the way they look at the table level. They are starting to get the numbers that motivate me to paint the rest of the 3rd company.



The Dreads came out ok, once they were weathered all the brush stroke that annoyed me are harder to see.



The whole army looks good together, not just because it all yellow, but the weathering makes it blend together better. The infantry and vehicles look like they have been in the same dirt. Ron FTW is right, you want to tie the model into the environment.



I really like the look of the army on the table. it makes such a difference for me in the game when you have painted armies on a nice looking table. I know they are not the best painted army, but I am proud to put them on the table and I think folks will enjoy lining up their armies against them. That is what counts.

On The Bench: Getting ready for WAR Con GT

I forgot how much work getting ready for a GT is. As you can see from my bench things are coming along and very busy. Everything is yellow that needs to be yellow. The Drop Pod, vindicator, marines and razorback are ready for ink and weathering. The Dreads need a ton of work, they are the new worry now that the Drop Pod is coming along. The dozer blades are ready for paint. These are temporary until FW one come in. I don't want the worry of not having them in hand hanging over me.

Looking at the painting scoring system for WAR Con, it looks like I will get 24/30 points. Not bad, I may enter the Master of the Arsenal into the painting contest as my fist entry ever. I don't expect to win anything! He is good for me but there are so many talented painters in the single mini group, he won't even stand out.

All and all though I am happy with my speed painted Imperial Fists army. 2,000 point of Imperial Fists, 46 figures and 11 vehicles in 11 months. That is 2 figures a week plus a vehicle every month. That is with building an Eldar army and a 10th company army to test play. I have a full time job, I have not gotten divorced and my son still knows who I am... not bad.

Project: Imperial Fists, Dozer Blades

I am famous for failing difficult terrain tests with my Rhinos. Since I have been playing the 3rd Company I have passes 3 test and failed a dozen. Therefore I am breaking down and digging up 15 points to put dozer blades on my transport rhinos. I know this will mean I will never fail another test or just fail the same number twice in a row, but I buying myself an end to 'you should really think about dozer blades..' comments. Points well spent.

Now I have to figure out how to model them. I really like the Forge World Dozer Blades, but it is $80 to get them here before WAR Games Con in July and cash is tight, so hello bits box!

I found 3 old Chimera blades within about 2 minutes of looking. So here is what they look like. Not sure about the spikey part... Has anyone done a cool conversion for Dozer Blades?

Imperial Fists 3rd Comp - 2000 point Punch List

We are shooting for Wargames Con 40K Tournament in July. This means I need to get painting to finish the 2000pts list. Here is a picture of the current status:



There are getting there but there are 5 models not started with painting.

Not Started with Painting
1. Drop Pod
2. Dreadnought w/Assault Cannon
3. Ironclad Dreadnought
4. Assault Marines
5. Tactical Marine w/Multimelta

There are 9 models that are in progress:

WIP
1. Dreadnought w/Twin Linked Lascannon and Twin Linked Autocannon
2. Assault Marines
3. Assault Marine w/Flamer
4. Assault Marine Sergeant
5. 3x Tactical Marine
6. Vindicator
7. Razorback w/Twin Linked Lascannon

I think I am in good shape, but I do need to focus. Right now the Vindicator and Razorback are on the bench and some troops are staged. Eldar and 10th company have been put on hold.

Project: Imperial Fists, chaplain v2

Thanks Heresy Is the Only Answer I have a new jump chaplain . I have been using a converted walking chaplain up unitil now. Painting the new terminator chaplain was a great deal of fun, so I am looking forward to this. It is also good to get back to Project: Imperial Fists which has lag a little with me being distracted by Eldar.

I am going to use this opportunity to re-work my jump squad a little. Right now it is 8 man squad including a flamer, a sergeant with plasma pistol and power fist. I going to drop the plasma pistol and power fist and bump it up to 10-man with 2 flamer. The power fist has been under performing and I have only killed myself with the plasma pistol. On the other hand the flamer have done great job in almost every game. This will also give me the option of combat squading them. All for about the same point cost, roughly.

10 minute Eldar Test Results

Ok a layer of Mechrite Red fix the pink problem. So after three tests the 10 min process seems to work well. Green is still winning for the army color, so I may be going Biel Tan. Aspect warriors also be done this way. I should start looking at ~750 point lists.

Right now it is looking like:
Farseer
10 Guardians w/StarCannon and Warlock
5 Pathfinders
10 Dire Avengers w/Exarch and Wave Serpent
1 War Walker w/Scatterlasers

Something like that.

Eldar: More paint tests

More 10 min Eldar tests. Working out color. The Gnarls Green (P3) worked well as did the Cygnar Blue (p3). The Gore Red came out too pink, I am going to need to do some more Red testing for Fire Dragons and Warpspiders. The green is leading the way for Guardians squads and tanks, but I am not done with paint tests yet. My goal is to find a color scheme that less clown like but still has the codex look.

Project: Imperial Fists, milestone 1000+ points painted

Tonight, I passed a milestone. I now have 1000+ points of Imperial Fists fully painted. 1,224 points to be specific. Two Vindicators, Assault Squad with Chaplin with jump pack and Three tactical squads are complete! Next I am going to work on the 2 Dreadnoughts, Razorback and Drop pod I need to finish out the 1,850 list.

Project: Imperial Fists, Rhinos

Rhino 2 and 3 are done. This is the last paint project I can do without setting up the airbrush. sigh.. I may have gone a bit over board with the weathering but I was having fun with it. Now off to the garage to see how much I can get set up.

Project Status - Imperial Fists Full 3rd Battle Company part 2

So after some more assembly, I need to stop gluing and start painting. There is a point where you have too much bare plastic in a project. I find that it can hurt my motivation. Completing a squad at time you have this vision of what the whole will look like. There is an identity to the project and the more bare plastic the less I can see it.

All unpainted armies look the same to me. But with paint on them they turn into something more real. It is like without yellow this project would be about plastic which I have no real emotional tie to. Paint them yellow and I suddenly they are now Imperial Fists connected to all the great books, fluff and other painted Imperial Fists armies I drooled over.

So I have two painting projects before I have to have the airbrush setup. There are 4 marines that need weathering and two of the Rhinos need detail work and weathering. After that it is get the airbrush setup or die.

Project Status - Imperial Fists Full 3rd Battle Company

Here is a state of the project for Imperial Fists 3rd Company. Yes I am building the whole battle company. After looking at it I am not that far off. It was kinda a wild off in the future statement when it was suggested, but now I can see it coming together.

A tip of my hat to paintedpotato over at dakkadakka who has already completed a Imperial Fists Full Battle Company.

HQ 50%

• Buy Master of the Arsenal (Captain)
• Assemble Apothecary, Standard Bearer and Command Squad

Tactical Squad (1) 95%

• Paint Lascannon

Tactical Squad (2) 80%

• Paint Lascannon, Sergeant and Flammer
• Finish Weathering Rhino

Tactical Squad (3) 80%

• Paint Sergeant and Plasma gunner
• Finish Weathering Rhino

Tactical Squad (4) 20%

• Paint Squad
• Assemble Rhino

Tactical Squad (5) 10%

• Paint Squad
• Assemble Rhino and 5 Tactical Marines

Tactical Squad (6) 5%

• Buy a Rhino
• Paint Sergeant and melta gunner
• Assemble Rhino, 7 Tactical Marines and Heavy weapon

Devastators Squad (7) 10%

• Paint Sergeant and 5 Devastator Marines
• Assemble 4 Devastator Marines

Devastators Squad (8) 0%

• Buy one more Devastator box
• Assemble Sergeant and 9 Devastator Marines

Assault Squad (9) 90%

• Paint 2 Assault Marines

Assault Squad (10) 0%

• Buy one more Assault Squad box
• Assemble Sergeant and 9 Assault Marines

Armory Support 60%

• Paint 2 Dreadnought s
• Assemble 1 Vindicator

So to finish things out I need 1 Assault Squad box, a Devastator box, a Rhino and a Master of the Arsenal. Everything else, I have already. Need to assemble 3 Rhinos (maybe two more for the devastators), 12 Tactical Marine with bolters, 13 Devastators plus another Sergeant, 10 Assault Marines, command squad and a Vindicator. Painting is coming along, but has a long way to go. Once I get the airbrush set back up I will start cranking through that again.

I think tonight I will work on Rhinos.

Project: Imperial Fists, Assault Squad

I finished up weathering and details on the Space Marine Assault Squad. The helmets turned out good, although they do kinda look like a football team.


The weathering on the jump packs turned out great. I had to dry brush some Chaos Black to get the scorch marks dark enough.

You may wounder why only 8 Marine, the reason is to keep them down around 200 points. I found that the durability of 8 vs. 10 is not that great and keeping them around 200 means I can field this squad in a 750 point game.

Project: Imperial Fists, Chaplin

While waiting for bases to dry on the current 5 marines I am painting, I picked up my Space Marine Chaplin in Terminator Armor and played around. There is a product I had been meaning to test out, Vallejo Liquid Gold.

Over all I love the results. It is harder to work with being alcohol based. It drys fast if you put it on a pallet so you have to work quick or paint out of the bottle. The pigment settles fast and you have to keep shaking it back up.

edit: by the way.. this is totally a work in progress, lots of detail work and clean up. But, for a couple of hours work while bases dried... I am happy. enjoy

Project: Imperial Fists, Progress

A quick post to show off the progress of Imperial Fists Project.

Vindicator 1 and 2 are shaping up. There is still lots of clean up, details and weathering to do. I have Vindicator 3 in the box waiting for room on the workbench.


Rhino 2 and 3 are about at the same point. The Tactical markings where done by making a stencil out of plastic-card. Still lots to do on them yet. They are not table ready.

Tactical marines round 2 Started with me trying to find a better way to base and being generally unhappy with the quality of round 1. This combat squad turned out much better. there are still little things I could work on, but it is just a matter of spending more time.

Well that is about it for things with enough yellow on them to show off, now more painting.

Project: Imperial Fists, Time vs. Result

After looking at my test paint squad for a couple of weeks, I came to the conclusion I wasn't happy with the fast paint job. The level of detail I had put into them was poor. While painting round 2 I have brought the level of painting up a bit and fix some of the things that annoyed me looking at the test paint squad. The results is I am happy with the 5 new marines I just finished and the project as a whole has slowed down.

So after spending more time cleaning mold lines, painting lenses, cleaning over paint and a whole new method of bases, here is the result:

I am happier with the result, but it will take more like 3-4 hours + drying time per-marine instead of 1-2. For example, the base now requires 3 drying cycles instead of one and they wash is now painted on to where I want it instead of all over, all of this takes time. With painting time being precious as a working Dad, it is going to take a while before I am on to my next project. However, I am much more proud of my army... lesson learned.

Project: Imperial Fists, Test paints done.

Here is a shot of the first 4 test paints done (almost). The air brush is making things go much faster than I expected. Although I am not getting much time to paint. There is about 20 more tactical marine in the process at the moment.

The other project score was I have all three Vindicators. Including a old Forgeworld model I bought for my Ultramarines and never fully assembled. I am in the process of rehabilitating it including using spare Leman/Chimera tracks from the great tank project. All praise the bit box!

Project: Imperial Fists

Here is a better photo of the paint test. I still have clean up and some details. Having not painted for a couple of years, my brush control is still getting back up to speed. However if you interested in the process use here it is...

Interesting Tools:

Seam Scraper from Micro-Mark

Liquitex Airbrush Medium

Les' Wash Recipe

Assembly and Prep:

No real notes here. Since this is a table army, the interior is not painted and the doors are all glued shut. I have some Forgeworld doors for the rest of the Rhino, but for the paint test I didn't use them.

I sanded down some of the glue lines. The biggest headache for me with Mark II Rhinos is the places where the model fits together. I always seem to get spots where glue mars the surface. So I sanded those spots down and cleaned up mold lines with my handy flash removal tool.

Once I clean up the model lines, I cleaned the surface and primed the model using the airbrush. To prime, I mixed Vallejo Game Color White Primer 1:1 with Liquitex Airbrush Medium.

Paint:

A base coat of VGC Plague Brown mixed 1:1 with Windex was applied with the airbrush. After letting the base coat dry for 24 hours, I applied a highlight of VGC Sunblast Yellow with the airbrush from the top of the model making sure not to pant anything that would end up in the shadows.

Once the base and highlight color was dry. I painted the 'fenders' VGC Gory Red. I made an arrow mask out of tape to use as a stencil for the troop insignia. (that needs more work). Then I Painted the black details and tracks.

Weathering:

I used APJ's Soft Body Brown Wash Recipe to create oil/rust marks around bolts and drew the wash down the side of the Rhino to simulate water weathering. A dry brush of VGC Beasty Brown was used to add mud effect along the bottom edges of the tank.

Dark brown pigment was used around the areas where dirt would collect and Black (soot) pigment was applied around the exhaust.

Finally, Paint chips were added by painting black and filling in the center with VCG Gun Metal.

Next Steps:

I still need to test varnishing with the airbrush. Before that I need to do some more work on details like the aquila and purity seal. Like I said, still a lot to do but the process is fast. I have only spent a couple of an hour or so on the test model and I would not feel bad putting it on a table.

Project: Imperial Fists

Ever since I first started looking at Space Marines, I wanted to paint an Imperial Fists army. The problem was the color yellow. It is hard to get good shadows when painting yellow. Recently I got back into painting after not painting for a couple of years and I decided to once again go after the dream. Thanks to some awesome tutorials online I finally have results I don’t hate.

After a couple of test paints I have a scheme I like. Here is a bad photo of the test paints. I will post more about how I am painting them and better photos when I get back in town.