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the time and energy to do a full Battle Company is an impressive one. Congrats on the penultimate achievement!

Thanks!, can't wait to get them all painted, even if it is a bit of a mammoth task still..

*shudders*

Yo etc..

Been a bit strapped for toy time recently (boo) but some work has progressed on the 'Raven..



Blue with black wash..



2 layers of blue drybrushing..



Then the most time consuming part of it all, the blue lining..this is about a third done here and now it's nearly complete..but not had a chance to press on much further... much of my spare time has been spent trying to clear out my collection and sell the extraneous stuff on eBay, this necessitated lots of rummaging in old boxes and photographing stuff...like this old guy..



He's on eBay now, bit sad to part with all my old Epic stuff but I don't use it anymore anyway and someone else will hopefully get a lot more fun out of it. I also spent a disturbing amount of money on KR cases to facilitate packing my stuff away...hopefully the eBay stuff will offset this somewhat.

The next BatRep in our Escalation Campaign has been completed too and there's another on the way sooner or later. Link if you want to check it out..

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/30/640921.page#8053084

Ta Ta.

Raven is coming along nicely.

I need to trim my excess stuff, but I don’t have the heart for it. That and I avoid ebay; it's a slippery slope I don’t need to go near. Plus I don’t want to have to figure out how to ship all my crap everywhere, and what it would cost to do so.

I’m enjoying the batreps. We march for Macragge!

SO it's been a while. I still exist. I debated whether to talk about the reasons for not posting or not and I decided to talk about it. My partner was diagnosed with Cancer whilst pregnant with our son, after 3 years she succumbed to it and in a few days it will be the year anniversary of her going. It's been a pretty unimaginable time and some of the previous blog was obviously written during it, there are some oblique references. I decided to just say it now as it was probably going to come up, the reasons for not posting etc and it's not a secret. I am not expecting anything from anyone here in sympathy etc as only a few knew her but part of trying to reengage with the world in general is to talk about it I think.

I have also, recently, felt the itch to play with my tiny war men. I think during this whole period it's been a form of art therapy and it feels like that now. It's always brought me peace and I do enjoy lobbing battlecannon shells vaguely in my enemies direction. I have still managed to acquire a few choice pieces (more on that later) and started a bit of painting/modelling. The loss of my painting room is a bummer but a kind gift from MLCS was a portable paint station so that suffices for now. I did do a tiny bit of SM stuff and have some fancy bits of stuff for them but for now I will focus on the IG as I feel inspired by them the most.

I've a few bit lying round still and have accidentally retail therapied myself some more stuff from Ramshackle Games which should arrive any day now. I have made a start with some of the kits I already have, first to do is a Special weapons squad and another rocket battery..some pics of that stuff to follow soon.

Hope I didn't freak anyone out with all that unbridled honesty, hope you like the toys to follow. I won't have much time to do stuff and my kid seems pretty keen on being ill and never going to nursery ever again which is further crimping my war dollies time. However at the mo I do feel quite inspired so we will see what happens. There is ever scurrilous rumours that the campaign we were doing might be restarted too, that would be fun as I enjoyed the variety of those games......

xxx

I’m sorry to hear about your problems. If there is any support I can give through the interwebs, please let me know. While a pale shadow of your situation, I’m also using retail/painting therapy to help get me through some rough times. It can be good to sit down at the bench and just block everything out of your life but the mini and the fuzzy stick. And a healthy dash of escapism on the battlefield is also very therapeutic. But more importantly, it’s good to get out and surround yourself with friends. Gaming is a positive social experience, and that can be critical to getting through hard times.

I try to no bore/burden the readers of my blog with my issues, but it can be a good place to vent. While some people might just skip past the personal baggage to look at the pretty minis, there are a number of friends who offer sympathy and support. And that’s something I need.

Looking forward to seeing more of your minis and battle reports. Hang in there. Courage and Honour!

Crickey!! sorry to hear about the personal problems and glad you back posting, the Raven was looking good last year and looking forward to seeing what you currently working on, I too find a certain distraction from other issues while modelling. Always feel better after a good session of painting or fabricating stuff.

Thanks, sorry to hear people are having hard times too, gak rains down on us all.

Nev, we will just have to keep our chins up and relax with the occasional Xenocidal pogrom..... I also have a years worth of your blog to catch up on....

Alaricuk, the Raven is nearly done now will cover that soon, been feeling all 'guardy' recently, there isn't much to do with them till the IG are 'finished' so that might be a draw (there's still lots of SM stuff, bit daunting).

Hey Randy! i joined dakka after you stopped posting but i regularly come back and look at your plog, its a personal favourite of mine. Love all the character you put into your guard blokes, so I'm pretty chuffed that your starting this up again
I'm sorry for your loss man, glad you've picked yourself back up dude. All the best

Guess who's back, back again, Randy's back, tell a friend.
Guess who's back, guess who's back, guess who's back, guess who's back...etc

Good to see your inner pew pew is getting stronger. xxx

That's terrible. My condolences, and anything else I can offer. Glad to hear you're getting back into things.

One of my first posts here on dakka was about cool fluffy armies that you could make, the first idea of which was and Ultramar PDF force.

A quick search of the forums and lo and behold you'd already done one!

Very impressive, and very inspirational stuff

My condolences, that must be a terrible burden to bear.

Same thing I told Nev, most people are here to listen, either to give painting advice, to watch what you post or to comment, etc. Don't feel bad about brushing the dust off, my life got to be so hectic my plog has completely inactive and I am just gonna redo it since it's been so long.

Anyways, if you need to vent, go for it. It won't bother me.

Looking forward to your continued work.

Aw man Randy....I'm so sorry to hear. That has to be so hard. I can't even begin to imagine. I'm heartwarmed to hear good news as well, you're choosing to heal. As others have stated, if there is ANYTHING we can do through this Dakka device to help, please let us know.

STG wrote:Hey Randy! i joined dakka after you stopped posting but i regularly come back and look at your plog, its a personal favourite of mine. Love all the character you put into your guard blokes, so I'm pretty chuffed that your starting this up again
I'm sorry for your loss man, glad you've picked yourself back up dude. All the best

Thank you. It's very inspiring to hear one is a reference point. I had a look at your gallery too, also very characterful troopers I think.

Alex Kolodotschko wrote:Guess who's back, back again, Randy's back, tell a friend.
Guess who's back, guess who's back, guess who's back, guess who's back...etc

Good to see your inner pew pew is getting stronger. xxx

Yes I think it is a bit. Looking forward to seeing your gestating Genestealer Cult stuff claw it's way out to the sunlight (in time to get flamer'd). I think they will be a great adversary, any movement on that front?

Ynneadwraith wrote:That's terrible. My condolences, and anything else I can offer. Glad to hear you're getting back into things.

One of my first posts here on dakka was about cool fluffy armies that you could make, the first idea of which was and Ultramar PDF force.

A quick search of the forums and lo and behold you'd already done one!

Very impressive, and very inspirational stuff

Thanks a lot. Glad you like the idea, the PDF pair very well with the Marines on the table too.

Stormwall wrote:My condolences, that must be a terrible burden to bear.

Same thing I told Nev, most people are here to listen, either to give painting advice, to watch what you post or to comment, etc. Don't feel bad about brushing the dust off, my life got to be so hectic my plog has completely inactive and I am just gonna redo it since it's been so long.

Anyways, if you need to vent, go for it. It won't bother me.

Looking forward to your continued work.

Thank you for all your kind words. I hope I do manage to keep it going.

dsteingass wrote:Aw man Randy....I'm so sorry to hear. That has to be so hard. I can't even begin to imagine. I'm heartwarmed to hear good news as well, you're choosing to heal. As others have stated, if there is ANYTHING we can do through this Dakka device to help, please let us know.

Thanks. I think I am choosing to heal, I haven't wanted to sometimes but my boy is a good reason.

Thanks to everyone.

Here are some pictures of toy soldiers I should have probably grown out of by now; these are the guys I have ready to go and what I would like to do this 'rotation':



Here is a rough working out of my special weapons team, they are what I'm working on now and I will go over them in detail in the next post or so..




Here's the rest of the unit..



Some very knackered heavy guys Alex donated..will form part of the rocket battery..



Some very preliminary work on the rocket team..



Mr Headache, will be my Primaris...



A lovely metal Yarrick donated by MLCS......

#

Solitary Ratling also from MLCS (and Mephistoned actually) who will get added to my existing unit..



Old Assassins, Eversor the the 'other' one..just so I have one of each...

I'm also expecting a little supply drop (maybe today squeeee) which will be my mystery next IG project....

Once all that is done (oh and some ADL sections) I will have 'finished' the IG. It will be about 5500pts which is hardly any really, especially when you consider there's a super command Shadowsword at about 750pts and around 300 in Assassins....there are about 175 infantry and 20 tanks ish. Then I will try to get on with the SM pile...

Thanks to everyone again.

xxxxxx

OMG I wish my kid would stop being so selfishly ill and just go to nursery a bit, nearly a week off already (and he was off a bit ago as well). I had yesterday cleared to have a big hobby spooge but instead I was forced to spend time with my child...

Here's some stuff on the special weapon team..



I see them as a squad of engineers so they have various kit and visors n stuff..(seen here at the 1st stage of basecoating)..



Leftie has a GS visor and a Catachan radio kit cradled to his leg. He also has a sarge's chainsword arm so he can have the stripes as squad leader and a GS hand holding the equipment. The other guy has a Elysian demo charge (I found in a box whilst taking apart my geek room from a very old army of MLCS's) ready to throw..



2 lasgunners. Gave the first guy a box of stuff (probably Pot Noodles) using a GL supporting arm chopped at the wrist and rotated through 90 degrees with a GS handle, the box is chopped down vox kit, I've made a few like that before. Both have backpacks not evident here..Rightie has a GS visor and a relaxed attitude refreshing in this increasingly stress filled world. He also has a big pack off a WWII kit I had lying around at his hip...



Special weapons. These guys were donated by Alex as by products of eBay orders a while ago. The melta had a visor added and a respirator off the command sprue, this makes him a bit different from the other 2 versions of this model I already have...the plasma has a new head I salvaged, which is a nice FW Cadian targeter head.



Squad after 2nd layer of basecoat and awaiting inks..

The idea behind this unit is (in game terms) to deny deepstrikers. As most IG players know other commanders love to 'rain men' on their carefully constructed firing squads, taking all the fun out AV14 by shooting the tanks in the bum. This squad's role is to lurk behind tanks/artillery and when a nice big squad of Blood Angles or Crisis Suits (to pick 2 units totally at random) drop in, they can either provide a alternate target or avenge the recipient of the DSing squads attentions by lobbing a demo charge at them (and hosing any survivors in melta and plasma fire). Obviously the squad can be killed by exploding vehicles, rout, get pinned, rout, already be dead and/or kill themselves (or indeed whatever they are supposed to be protecting) with a bad demo scatter but if you want certainties don't play IG. The idea of them being engineers is stolen from Owen Rees' lovely drop army, they have a special weapon squad modeled as such and I've made my own version.

These guys are nearing completion in painting terms and I've been building my rocket squad too. The Ramshackle order arrived and I'm very pleased with that, more on it soon.

xxx

Special weapons teams are looking good so far.

EDC

Looks like a fun batch of troopers.

Kids get sick at the most inconvenient times. It’s like their superpower.

evildrcheese wrote:Special weapons teams are looking good so far.

EDC

Ta, no painting last night as my kid took 2.5 hours to go to sleep and today he is still off nursery, might squeeze in a bit this eve if he goes to sleep reasonably..

Nevelon wrote:Looks like a fun batch of troopers.

Kids get sick at the most inconvenient times. It’s like their superpower.

Isn't it just? He's gone from diarrhea to fever to back again to runny nose to hacking cough today, we are now 8 days in with no nursery and only 2.5 hour off when a friend looked after him for a bit...FML.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
So my order off Ramshackle Games arrived, here are the goods:



I ordered 5 of their Robots, the mathematically gifted amongst you will have already calculated there are 7 here. I also thought the bodies and legs were a single piece and unaware there were 3 different types of legs...I also got 7 torsos (not pictured)..



He has also sent me 7 of the heads I ordered as well as a smattering of other ones for me to experiment with, thanks!



Only 6 powerpacks, however...



Here are the gun barrels, I requested 5 of the big strip to the right and got 10. Also a pretty extensive mix of the rest available, including a back mount and 4 other weapon mounts. The back mount thing will take the place of the missing powerpack....



I also only got 6 sets of arms, both gun and fist types, the above set will let pad out the last guy with a pincer and a directly shoulder mounted gun...all the weapons have a blank face to mount whatever kind of barrel you want..



Here's a quick bluetacking of a Robot..note blank on gun awaiting shooter bit....



Also in comedy head version, 'I say, any Pimms?

So these guys will be my Ogryns, I've got some 40mm bases I ordered for these guys but the unexpected freebies now mean I need another 2, bastard. I think they will go well as Ogryn counts as, I don't like the current GW ones. They are also much cheaper, 5 currently cost £25 delivered and the GW ones are £28 for 3 and I would either have to actually go to a GW or pay postage. I also got 7. I also pleasantly surprised by the cast quality, very clean with some minor flashing, no obvious flaws, very nice.

I also got this..



But that's for another post..

Track unit looks promising, and i agree, the new ogryns are way worse than the old ones

Is it time for the robot revolution? Kill all humans!

Bzzt. Ckcik!

STG wrote:Track unit looks promising, and i agree, the new ogryns are way worse than the old ones

Thanks more on that soon, did some building today. Yeah the new Ogs suck. I kind of liked the ones that came out with Apocalypse1 but only a few of the sculpts, and they were over £10 each.

Nevelon wrote:Is it time for the robot revolution? Kill all humans!

Bzzt. Ckcik!

Goddamn toasters! Will make sure to set the kill all option to Xenos. Not sure if I should update them to Windows10 or not.

More stuff soon.

My kid finally went to nursery for a day, yay. I finished off most of the painting on the engineers and prepped them for basing. No pics as I planned to do that this morning but he was a bit peeky again and so missed nursery (again). So in 2 weeks he's done 2 half days and 2 whole days. He really is a gem but times are tough atm and a bit of space and/or escapism would be nice.

I do have some pics of another unit I've started, my 2nd Rocket Battery..



Member these guys? The spotter had he binoc arm right up high and it was fused with a ton of plastic glue so I just pulled it down and will fill in the tear later..



Wasn't sure what to do with this guys missing arm, eventually plumped for resting it on a wall (not installed yet)..



Basic crouching launcher guy and loader hauling ammo...all very rough at this planning stage..



I wasn't sure what to do with the bases (as I always do some sort of terrain) and decided to do the shelled out building thing I did with the previous team. I liked it had some of the same bits left over and it would make them look good if placed together.



The ruined building are from epic, I will fill some gaps etc to make it less obvious..





These are just first passes and are still in the planning stage..

Hope you like, I'm probably not going to get a bunch of time to waste with this stuff for a bit got a heavy week ahead but I do feel inspired to crack on so might squeeze a bit in anyway..

xxxx

Here's a bit more on the mysterious track unit thing..



Built into sub assemblies..the guns go with the central tower bit behind them and were something I had from a previous order, it was very late so Curtis threw in a AA gun (which I was very happy with).



Here it is bluetacked together..meltagunner for scale.



The front plate bit is actually supposed to go under the gun as the bit the turning plate sits on, I added it to the front as it extends it a bit more making it closer to the foot print of a Hydra.



I'm thinking of adding either a pintle mounted heavy bolter or a bi-podded one to that front plate (as a Hydra has on) but am not sure, I've just put this together properly today and may experiment with it..do you think it needs it/be good? I like this version of the Hydra as it looks more low tech and unimpressive, more like something a PDF unit would be issued/find. I may make a kneeling technician guy like my Lascannon batteries have too.

I've also finished the painting of my Engineers and started the Rockets, there has been some preliminary sorting done on the robots as well. In other shocking developments; I actually played a game on Monday, 1K vs Mephistoned's Blood Angles. We had a proviso that we could only pick 1 of any slot that wasn't troops and no flyers. This gave us the chance to deploy lots of infantry and stuff whilst being able to do quick(er) games. I then spectated whilst he played MLCS's Tau (his new Tau, so not all suits but Infantry and tanks) with the same stipulations, I have pics of this and might do a little report.

Anywhoo, hope you like...Hopefully I can do some finished pics of my Engineers tomorrow and maybe squeeze in a bit of painting too.

Stay classy.

Looks good, that track unit.

Thanks, yes it caught my eye too. I managed a little toy time earlier and snapped off some shots of the completed engineers, I will try and post them later.

Xx

Reenforcements incoming.
Happy early merry Krampus. X

That's really very kind thank you! You obviously remembered our conversation, fortunately I haven't kept up with eBay searches and got one myself.

Really, thanks again.

No worries. I was in Area 51 (our flgs for those not in the know) and found one without all of the crap stuck to it, well built tracks and fairly thin paint. I was buying quite a chunk of other stuff so they pretty much chucked it in.
I'm not sure if it's worthwhile stripping it as some of the metallic details like the aquilla on the turret are a bit thick.
I didn't want to spoil the surprise but if I didn't let you know then you might have got one yourself too.
That'd leave you in the awful situation of having started another squadron and then you'd pretty much have a company so it'd be rude not to complete it.
That way madness lies, trust me and my crates of loose tanks.

Still, thanks. Yes this will take me to 5 Russ and I don't want to get on the slippery slope towards accidentally owning a Russ company. I was saying the other day to Alex that I would like a basic Russ to be the dedicated bodyguard for my Tank Commander's Vanquisher as I have to strip one of the squadron to be his compulsory guard ATM. They will probably remove this stipulation in the next book. I also wanted it to be the older version of the tank with no sponsons, just a splat cannon, the above seems to tick all the boxes.



Here are the completed Engineers. I think they have come out ok for effectively speed painted models..



Special weapon guys..thinking some heat damage might be nice on these now. The Plas guy has had a head swap and the melta; googles added out of GS as well as a gasmask from the command sprue.



Dude and squad leader (who probably should a helmet stripe as the others do) with more GS goggles.



Various kit, and massive mold line I missed, out of practice at spotting these till it's too late. I went with EN as a unit designation.



Demo charge guy and bullet catcher with GS specs.



Nice Elysian demo charge can be seen better here.

I actually fielded these guys in the game I had against Mephistoned the other day there is a slight chance of it getting BatRep'd by MLCS who took pics.



Some building has been going on with the robotic Ogryns too...more later..



Also looking at my Yarrick (oh er) and I am tempted to mount him on a bit of slate etc, I normally resist such gauche indulgences but it might be fitting for him, any thoughts? I'm also doing a tiny conversion to move the sword from the front to the back. Having all that gubbins under his claw makes him look oddly bulky, this config is much more slimming (black is too).

More soon hopefully.

Here's a little update to the Rocket squad..



They've all been built and spray undercoated, I've gone back over them and tidied up the gaps in the undercoat.



Here they are halfway through the basecoating stage, the bases have been 'sanded' too.





Need to do second layer of basecoat and then ink etc. Hope to get some more in today/tomorrow..

Once these guys and the Primaris are done, all my platoons for my company are complete again. I plan to get them out and do a little tidying and some renumbering as units will be reorganised a bit. I hope to be able to get a few nice pics of them and if so I will post em up..