Gitsplitta wrote: Actually, that's one of the things I'm still looking for. The original build came with a magnetized turret to go on top, but the Cambulance is already over twice as tall (3-4x the mass) of a normal nob bike. So I'll save the turret for one of my battlewagon re-builds and am looking for a working emergency light bar from a toy of some sort that I can wire up. So far, all the working versions I've been able to find are far too big, but if I can even find one that doesen't work, I'll get it on there temporarily until I can find what I really want.
Great suggestions guys! I'll take them into consideration.
@Cam: Thanks mate, I'll need those!
How did the tourney go? Well, it was enlightening.
Took my camera to take pics, but in the end all I kept was one. Deployment for my first game. The rest were just completely uninspiring as I'd totally forgotten to take any "action" shots.
Because Thing 2 and I spent the morning helping with a food drive for the Scouts, we missed game 1. The TO's however, generously let us join in the fun late for the second and third games. The tournament was a "White Dwarf" style tournament pattered after the ridiculous armies you'd usually see the staff playing with in the magazine. The main FOC restriction was that you couldn't have two units of anything except troops... and that included dedicated transports. Variants of a vehicle didn't count either (so only 1 land raider for example, no matter what version it was). 1750 pts. What's interesting is that it was the same basic game each time with 3 different deployments. There were a primary objective (holding most of 5 objectives) and a series of 9 or 10 "achievements" that you could claim (but no more than 2 per game and you couldn't claim the same achievement twice, even from different games). Very interesting.
My army was fluffy and not the least bit competitive. I did have a 5-man nob bike unit (that's including the boss) & a dakka jet, but that's where the good units ended. Regular bikes, grot tanks, shoota boys, some kans, a dread and a KFF mek.
First game was against another ork player with a more competitive list. Big nob bike unit. Battle wagon filled with aard boyz. Lootas behind a ADL+ quad gun... stuff like that. We tied the primary (to win the primary you had to hold 2 more of the 5 objectives than your opponent) and picked up linebreaker... but didn't get any other points. Thing 2 chewed through the nob bikes but in the end their warboss and a biker were running amok through the rear of my lines. My nob bikers, untouched... had finally chewed their way through the battle wagon and aard boyz & were about to do the same... but the game ended early. Pic below is deployment. My stuff is in the foreground.
Game 2 was against one of Thing 1's friends (who is a very accomplished player... almost made the Sweet 16 at the Adepticon championships). He was playing chaos with a flying black mace demon thing, hell drake, large bike squad & 70 zombies w/ an aegis wall and quad gun.
Basically the demon was unstoppable. Everything it hit it killed or routed in one or two assault phases. Again, Thing 2 saved our dignity by sending the kans and dread into the bikes & eventually killing them while I sacrificed my entire command to keep the demon off our troop units. Thing two then sent his sole surviving kan charging to one of the 35 strong zombie cultist units that was so long it stretched from the back of the board to the middle near an objective. The kan killed exactly two of them, forcing a morale roll at -2. They failed & ran 7". But even though the front of the unit was at mid table, the back was only a few inches from his board edge (in spite of following up into assault) so the rearward guys fled off the table taking the rest of the squad with them! This allowed us to tie the primary again, even though at the end of the game, we only had a lone dakka jet circling the table taking pot-shots at zombies. Once again, no achievements.
So, it was fun. A nice way to spend an afternoon.
I'm sad to report that grot tanks suck. They're half-again the cost of a rokkit buggies with the only appreciable differences being that they're slower, are worse at snap firing and get a 5+ invul. Now... I'm OK with their sucking as long as the points work out... but 4 grot tanks (including RLs, red paint & boss tank) are as much as a land raider. That's just crazy.
The day did help clarify in my mind what makes a good ork army though. I've written up a list at 1500 & 1750 that I think are about as purely competitive as I can make them. They wouldn't have been legal or appropriate for this tournament of course... but at least I have something down on paper.
Now come on Gits you should know by now Orks can not be calculated and planned and are never strategically thought out. Another game those little tanks will blow away a bloodthirster, it's all luck. You just have to dazzle the enemy with your brilliant looking army.
You had fun. All is well interesting to see how you faired vs daemon/zombie, actually sounds like you coped ok under the circumstances. I understand the grot frustration - they should be daft, but not pointless. A good read!
Been running them as rokkit buggies. They're fine that way. Though I'm considering that they might be more viable if I ran the whole mob with grotzookas... be slightly cheaper and would put out a prodigious amount of anti-infantry fire power... but then that's never been the ork's problem.
FINALLY was able to sit down and paint today. Doesn't look like much but at this point ANY progress is good progress. Got some odds & sods done as well as the cow catcher, chain and some hooks. Rails are in and base coated... not sure where I'm going to go with them yet. The hinge pin on one of the doors broke. Going to see if I can replace it with a brass pin.
Good to be back in the saddle again. Expect more progress soon.
*chuckle* Welcome aboard Dkb! This blog is kind of a mixed bag actually... but I think there's some good stuff here and there.
@Cam: No worries mate, I'll get it sorted.
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Hey Cam! Came up with something you might be interested in. Fixed the door very easily without having to change the pin. Turns out that the fit of the pin (probably augmented by a little overflow paint) was just too tight and broke the hinge off the body of the truck. Solved the problem very easily. Put a very thin layer of "Labelle 102 plastic gear lubricant" on the pin (a little goes a long way). This stuff (or something like it) can be found at any model railroad hobby store. It's made for lubricating the plastic gears of model railroad locomotives. It works like a charm. Pins move freely without binding or friction. You might want to give it a try in some of your construction.
Haha, I love that Cambulance.
Good idea, and nice paintjob on it. I like the white on the wheels, looks really surprising for an ork vehicle, and that's why it looks so good.
Busted my butt to get the Cambulance done today but didn't quite make it. One more thing (the grot driver) to do. Pics when that's done... hopefully... tomorrow.
Give-or-take... Cambulance is done. I fiddled with a few of the extra bits... even added a couple of my own. Now it won't be complete (fully) until I find an emergency light bar for it... but that's out of my control at the moment, so this'll have to do. There are a couple of places I'd like to fiddle with it yet, but that's best done after I set it down for a while and can come back fresh at a later date.
Just realized that the rust is rather haphazard... some places have it... some don't. I'm in the process of fixing that to give it a bit more uniformity from a logical perspective. Some other things need touching up as well. Lord, I hate the internet...
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OK, rust is fixed. Not worth a separate set of shots though. When I find a light bar for it I'll re-post.
There are dark and crusty bits on the blood inside as well as the brighter red parts... let me see if I can find the pic I did earlier.
OK, found the pic. Doesn't show up really well. The stuff spattered across the walls is mostly red but the blood pooled on the floor is largely dark. I could try and take another pic of the interior if you'd like. I would like to "finish" the interior some day... just not in the cards right at this moment.
What about a "Wrecker" choppa? One that's a tow-truck. You got the Cambulance to pull the bodies out, now you need something to pull the wrecked bikes out!
So very well done Gits! the rust is brilliant and that lens is stunning! you've got so much character crammed into that models paint job it just compliments Cams work superbly!
Hey... he's green... stuck behind enemy lines... no hope of immediate extraction. He's just trying to blend in. Who do you think is calling the Waaagh!?
3 days of reading has convinced me to return to this wonderful universe. Gitsplitta I feel I owe you some thanks and also apologies as I have stalked your every blog. Your painting is gorgeous, your conversions brilliant and your family driven wargaming something I am very jealous of.
Thanks Edreynaline... you just put a smile on my face that'll take several days of work-a-day world to erase! In other words consider your thanks gratefully accepted!
I actually feel guilty because I haven't been motivated to do much building/painting lately. Just too much to do with the family... which is a good thing of course, but I do miss the interaction on dakka during my non-productive periods and I don't feel like I'm earning my keep. As I always preach though... "real life comes first!" As it did this weekend with 3 wonderful days camping with friends and family.
I'll be back in the saddle soon enough, and you can pat yourself on the back for helping me to get there! Please don't let this be the last time you post. I'm a lot worse when I'm just floundering around on my own.
Finished off the holiday weekend by taking the family to see Godzilla 2014 3D. Very fun. Everyone had a minor gripe or two, but that didn't stop us all from enjoying the movie. Go, go Godzilla!
Sorry Cam. It's a beautiful, not-too-hot summer here and my mind is just not on painting at the moment... I'll get back to it eventually... and the results will be better when I'm motivated and inspired.
Started working on a grot tank in order to make room for some fantastic custom-builds that Littletower is making me! Thought I'd do something very unorthodox... just for fun. A white grot tank!
It's pretty close to done... going to get just a spot of weathering, some graffiti and perhaps a bit more bad-moon like yellow here and there. Want to keep it mostly white though.
Thanks Case, I decided the unit needed some color. The three darker tanks are based on variations of metallics. All have significantly colored areas but they just seem to get lost in the darkness of the tank, so I thought I'd do some more brightly colored versions for a while. The last of the Forge World grot tanks will be red. When I get the custom builds from Littletower, I'll dip into green, blue and who knows what else.
I'll also be pulling out my grot mega-tank soon. Hope to be running a full tank squadron (one mega-tank and two grot tank escort units) soon.
Ahh, I have heard of a Grotzooka. But that was all I knew of it.
I was pretty close with rusty-metal Blunderbuss then. Proves you have done a good job.
Nice work, Gits. Good to see you back to your greenskins as well! Must admit I wasnt too sure when I first saw the white, but it really grows on you when you look at the details you added, and of course when theyre all together!
Thanks Ramos. Well, it was kind of a challenge to myself. I wanted to see if I could make white believable. Now, in my mind this is a fairly new tank... so while I added a bit of metallic chipping, I didn't add any rust. I did wash all the white in a very light grey to take the edge off it a bit, though on the turret I added some white back over the top. Then some mud for the tracks and some other colors (yellow and red) to mix it up a bit.
The trick was (for once), not overdoing the weathering and chipping.
Working on the last of the grot tanks... You can see the main color scheme developing but still have a long way to go & there will be a lot of black and white checks to break up the red.
Well, it's kind of another challenge. Like the white tank, an airbrush seems rather un-grotty... so my challenge is to use one in the process of creating a convincing looking paint job.
Made good progress on the grot tank yesterday. Started on the turret which is uncharacteristic for me. Think it's because I got tired of the 3 pieces constantly dropping all over the place & just wanted to finish it so I could get them permanently assembled. Very happy with it though, looks nice.
yeah,
Very nice grot tanks.
Are you running them WYSIWYG as 4 rocket tanks and two zookas tanks or as 6 rokkits?
You have two komanders so this is two squads?
@Panic: All the weapons are magnetized so I can swap them out. I plan on eventually running two groups of six, so the komanders will be split between the two (but in the mean time I can just pop the extra ML off of one of the tanks). I will run them WYSIWYG in my games.
Thanks guys. It's nice to have the full set done. I'll begin work on the second set (a-la Littletower) soon, but first... something BIG is in the offing!
Nothing yet, but with the holiday (Thanksgiving) I expect the post to be delayed a bit. We'll see if anything arrives on Monday.
OK, here's the next project. Picked up my partially done Big Squiggoth and began working on it again. It's really slow going but I think I have my color scheme worked out now so hopefully it'll go a bit faster from now on.
Close up on head. Still much to do but at least it looks like something now. The armor will be treated the same way as the big gob. Yellowish/brown plates with boltgun metal accents.
You know, I realised that after posting and went back to edit what I'd said but was too tired to figure out what to write.
His skin actually looks awesome, sorry I didn't see it, the red on the armour and my lack of sleep gave me a sort of snow blindness/tunnel vision to the mouth.
Brilliant. This is one of my favourite's of yours. Going to be awesome with that colour armour. Are you still doing the fortress on top? Skin tone is looking fantastic and glowing.
You know, I don't really dig the skin being 'fully painted' at this point. I figure, this is a Squiggoth. It's a Centerpiece for your army, and it's wonderfully detailed, and you're only going to be painting the one, probably ever. I think you should go further than just a flat color and a couple washes.
What I'd like to see is feathering done on individual scales (not necessarily all of them, but some of the bigger ones), and taking the time to go in with either a wash or both slightly darker and slightly lighter shades of red and patterning the scales so they're not all a uniform color- splotches of shade like you'd see on a real-life scaled beasty. Maybe do the same with some purple-ish or orange-ish color as well.
See, the armour on the gob is so marvelously mottled and the horns, teeth and talons have that nice gradation- but the only change in color you have on the scales themselves are where the wash pooled in the low spots, it seems.
Well, I'm going to wet-blend it... which is a technique I really like but has kind of fallen by the wayside since I've discovered airbrushing. Airbrushing is just so damn efficient its a better choice for many circumstances. Not all though. While I could certainly airbrush the shades up in a fraction of the time... it wouldn't have the same gritty look when finished... and once I get rolling with a wet palate to keep the paint thin and smooth it shouldn't take too much time now that my areas are clearly defined. Just put something entertaining on the old computer DVD player and watch me go!
Should have another pic for you before bed time. Would appreciate a bump between now and then if someone sees this.
I really should work on wet blending, myself. There is a definite difference between airbrushed blends and wet blends. I've noticed that the latter done right gets you super creamy blends.
Indeed. They seem much more vibrant to me. Also you can focus the highlight in the center of the plate rather than the edges. Not particularly realistic but it does produce and interesting effect.
So, that's what I'm trying to go for here. You'll note that there is nothing smooth or creamy about this step. For orks, I like my blends to be rather haphazard and crude. The get more refined as I go and the sepia wash will help tie them all together. This is two layers of the lighter brown. If I was really serious about this, I'd do 3 or 4.
Wow, love that last pic of the Squiggoth! The contrast between the red skin and the yellow armor is going to be awesome.
Re: Centipede model, I like the paint job, but that "river of skulls" makes me cringe a little . I.e. the "What's missing, let's put a skull on it" policy of GW these days
Well, my Necrons are intended to be reminiscent of the original "Terminator" movie flash-forwards where the machines are walking over beds of skulls & bones. That's why they're on the bone bases.
Everything looks great but thing that impress me most on your work is lenses. You just do them perfectly. Could you please explain to us your process or some kind of mini tutorial would be most appreciated.
My only additional comment is that a lot of times my blends do not make a nice clean line, so I go back in with black to clean them up and make them nice and sharp.
Thanks Lt, keep in mind this is still very early in the process. Even after the yellow blends are done, the additions of the metal bits and the sepia wash will change everything.
Next step... this is the brightest yellow the figure will get. I've got two shades, one is slightly brighter than the other... so I did them in order, darkest first.
You can see in the next shot that I also painted the smallest rivet, bolt and fixtures... that's in preparation for the next step (sepia wash). I figured these elements were too small to take their own special wash so I'm painting them now so I can do everything at once.
Awesome work Gits, the washes pull everything together !
I also really like the photo of his face; the combination of the pink gums, horns, bare metal and yellow armor looks ace
Will the back-piece of the Squiggoth cover up the yellow base or will that show through the floor of the back-piece ? (I am sorry if that sounds confusing...)
I'm doing the from my phone in a ski lodge so I had to multi quote everyone, sorry.
chrisyella wrote:Awesome work Gits, the washes pull everything together !
I also really like the photo of his face; the combination of the pink gums, horns, bare metal and yellow armor looks ace
Will the back-piece of the Squiggoth cover up the yellow base or will that show through the floor of the back-piece ? (I am sorry if that sounds confusing...)
I got you. The how'd ah will cover the back, but um going to magnetize it on so I can proxy this as a truck as well.
Camkierhi wrote:Stunning. Brilliant work. Love everything.
Thanks Cam, means a ton coming from an ork-master such as yourself.
Zogg wrote:Brilliant piece of work.
But we need a close-up of his eye, preferably through the window of an Imperial Guard vehicle (Ã la Jurassic Park).
I'll see what I can do.
Anvildude wrote:And now for more tiny detailing work? I still think a little more individual attention to the scales would be fantastic.
I agree completely. Once I get it painted enough to be playable I'll revisit it for details.
Casey's Law wrote:Bloody 'eck! What a beautiful beast he is! Nice job, Gits, love how you utilized those washes.
Thanks so much Case! It makes for a slow painting process but in the end it seems worth the wait.
Thanks all for your kind comments, well see how much progress I can make on the how'd ah today.
Why do I think it needs Catepillar written on it, probably because it's an earthmover . The yellow is beautiful as ever . Sorry I've been so absent lately, only a little bit of time to spare and usually I only have enough time to post something quick.
I really love how striking the yellow is, when the howdah is done it's going to be glorious. For some reason I thought it was a bit bigger but it's certainly ample sized!
Even the Gargantuan one is small compared to other FW stuff of the same price. No more resin then a Eldar Scorpion tank for double the price. It is cool to see them though, as you don't very often.
Looking closely at mine as I was painting it... there's a bit of crudity about it that suggests it's an old sculpt (which I believe is correct). It's still a very nice model of course, but when you look into the nooks and crannies you see short-cuts or things designed for ease of casting that you don't typically see for models designed with modern casting techniques in mind.
I agree. You can really see the difference between the older sculpts and those few newer ones too. There is absolutely no comparison between my squiggoth and my mega-dread... the sculpting and casting / refinement of the mega-dread is far superior to that of the squiggoth.
Thanks everyone for your kind comments. Always nice to get positive feedback on a lengthy project. I'm guessing you guys don't really need to see me repeat the steps on the howdah. Same bat time, same bat channel. I'll try to do one step each night which should mean I'll be done by the week's end.
It really came out great, beautiful - and quite massive - addition to the army indeed!
Howdah is going to be carrying along the same yellow armour, right? Plans for breaking it up a bit? (Thinking about preventing the whole construct on top ending up overpowering the reds below, and the red-yellow/tan contrast that worked so well on the beast)
Very cool Gits that squiggoth looks fantastic, its a cool as hell model to begin with and a shame they don't turn up more often, awesomely painted, as yours is, anyway.
Here 'tis. I'm going to leave it the way it is for the time being. It's a really busy model and I'm not sure adding a bunch of free-hand detail is going to help it all that much. I will be adding more detail to the inside of the howdah however... but as I have a tournament tomorrow and this is the centerpiece of my army... this'll have to do for now. Votes welcome and greatly appreciated.
Thanks OneManNoodles! It was a really fun model to work with once I had the legs on (which was a major pain-in-the-butt). I've never seen one on the tabletop before, so it'll be fun to push it out there and see how it does.
@Cam: I'll put up an army shot and hopefully full battle reports from tomorrow's tournament.
@Ramos: That's the first time I've used brown as a base, I usually use white. It turned out very nicely I think. A bit ruddier than my MW yellow, which is quite appropriate.
@Gir: Thanks mate, and yes... yes it is.
OH, and Casey's Law is the genius who fixed up my avatar. All I could say was WOW and Thank You!.
Well gang, just back from my tournament. Very small affair unfortunately but those of us die-hards that were there had a fantastic time! Unfortunately my camera battery ran out almost immediately so all I got was a few deployment shots... if that. But... I can give you a brief overview.
My army:
Theme was of primary importance in the tournament. Each army was supposed to be the rag-tag remnants of an invasion gone wrong. Lost and forgotten they're trying to make their way back to friendly territory. My approach to this was as follows... 1. Only one of each unit. 2. All units undersized to simulate casualties (save for my grot tanks which I was showing off). 3. Mixed weapons in any units that could mix weapons (like the cans or grot tanks) to simulate remnants of larger units being cobbled together into new units. 4. Mist painting styles (grots and boys) again, to simulate remnants getting reassigned into new units.
Game 1 was against a largely gun-line eldar army. Beautifully painted with no duplication of units, but much more competitive than my list. The mission was a version of "the relic". Great game where I stole the victory at the last minute by some tank-shocking shenanigans as recommended by my opponent (thanks Steve, very cool of you). The grot tanks get the MVP for pulling off the stunt that let me grab the relic.
Game 2 was against a blood angel army. Had a couple of things I had no way of dealing with (land raider & storm raven). Still a very fun game. Meganobs piling out of the squiggoth and going to play with some tactical marines and a rhino was probably the MVP moment. Lost this one as my sneaky opponent jumped/dropped objective secured troops on two of MY objectives at the last minute! Still a great game & another fantastic opponent. Grot tanks & kans also pulled their weight in this battle.
Game 3 was against a highly competitive White Scars army. Now before you cry "foul!" it's my opponent's *only* army & it was nicely painted and interesting to play against. My bike squad really stood out this game as they cut two squads of SM bikes down to 1 each, but in the end he overwhelmed (i.e. ran over) the rest of my army. Not surprisingly the White Scars owned the day.
In the end, I won the "Serenity" award for having the best themed army. Considering "theme" was the main theme of the tourney... I was pretty pleased.
Had a wonderful time. Used my winnings to help get a copy of the Ghazzy supplement.
Gitsplitta wrote: I agree. You can really see the difference between the older sculpts and those few newer ones too. There is absolutely no comparison between my squiggoth and my mega-dread... the sculpting and casting / refinement of the mega-dread is far superior to that of the squiggoth.
I got a squiggoth pretty recently, and I had to replace a lot of rivets, especially near the tail, for soft blobbiness.
Thanks guys. To be honest there were actually more awards than participants so everyone went home with something... but I was particularly happy to have gotten the "Serenity" award for having the best theme as it was something I worked on specifically. Also my award (a little framed certificate) has got a picture of Serenity (the space-ship) on it & since I'm a Firefly fan, it's got a special place in my heart. It's also got a special place in my studio right next to my gaming table.
Best part of course was spending the day with a really great group of guys who I get to see far too infrequently. Had three really fun and interesting games, so really... how better to spend a Saturday eh?
Full of character and very characterful indeed! love your painting style Gits and the models especially the older ones exude so much.....well.....character! :-)
Amazing looking force, Gits! Congrats on the very well deserved theme win.
Squiggy looks right at home with the rest of the boyz. Love seeing the Cambulance and G0st on the table, too. Really stand out paint on those. the white draws the eye right to em!
A few more pics from the tournament. These were my deployment from game #1... just before my camera battery died (figures).
The "grot" warbikes with Cambulance (painboy on bike).
Grot panzers backing up an infantry company.
Big squiggoth escorted by kans. Nice arrangement as the KFF keeps everyone nice and safe.
Finally, I know I'd told you that the next project would be an ork mega-dread. Unfortunately as I was cleaning up all the pieces this morning I discovered that the body was badly miss-cast. I'm going to send off a picture to Forge World to see if they'll replace it (they're pretty good about such things), so in the mean time I needed another project. Now the significance of the mega-dread is that it was a Christmas gift from my wife that I never got around to painting (which miffed her a bit). So... I thought I'd better see if I could find ANOTHER gift that I hadn't made yet... and Voila (sp?), last year's gift... the amazing Kromlech version of a set of tankbusta squig bombs. I fell in love with these models the minute I spied them. I actually replaced the Kromlech head with another 3rd party offering (Puppet's War?).... in any case, I'm very happy with the build and it should be a delightful little project.
@Niru: I think they're clearly intended to be alternate figures for the squig bombs that the tankbustas can take. That's certainly how I'm going to run them. Then I could field two units... one with the real bomb squigs & one with these mechanized bomb squigs. Hmmm... that gives me a painting idea come to think of it.
Hey gang, me again. I'm posting because I'm not sure I'm going to get a chance to paint tonight... have to take Thing 2 Christmas shopping for his mom.
I am incredibly excited about painting the goliath mines (that's what Kromlech calls them). I primed them along with the "inventor" and have them lined up at the base of my computer monitor. I just get cranked-up looking at them! Indeed, LT nailed it. I plan on painting them in squig colors (reds... all my squigs are reddish) and either painting on or adding bits to look like eyes and teeth.
@LT: Yep, but keep in mind a standard base is 1" in diameter... so they're just a little bit on the big side. One of the wonderful thing about orks is that they have war-gear represented as individual models on the table... (riggers, ammo-runts, orderlies for example... and squig bombs of course). Since these are just representations of ideas rather than actual models that you interact with... there's really no limitations on what they look like.
Hey everyone! Thank you for your generous praise and encouragement. Sorry for not responding earlier but I wanted to have something done on the squigbots before I posted. Just got some of the basics done... bots are airbrushed & washed and the tracks are started. Still a lot to do on both the bodies and tracks before I can move on to adding any details. Unfortunately these are so busy you can't really see any gradient from the airbrushing (plus the wash wiped it out), but I still think they're going to look good when complete.
Not sure how much time I'm going to have to work over the weekend... have a lot of complicating factors and other demands on my time. Will do my best though.
Gitsplitta wrote: Mechanical Bomb Squig "Iggy" is done. Added eyes and a couple of fangs on the front for effect.
That is fantastic! Looks brilliant, lovely detailing. Only trouble I got is they are cute. Brilliant and cool and awesome, Fantastic paint job. But cute.
Maybe thats the point, squad of marines looking at it pointing, "Oh isn't it cute little tanky" BOOOOOOM!!!
@Anvildude: You're really going to laugh when you see the name of the third bot. I swear I had no awareness of the names of the ghosts. Must be some kind of cosmic pattern involved.
Here's the last one... "Doug".
... and the triplets together... Iggy, Ziggy & Doug.
Thank you one and all. So good to see a few new names responding too. Thanks for taking the time to comment! I think it's great that each of the three have their fans... means I must have done something right on all of them.
Well Ruglud... ask and ye shall receive.
So, I went for the mad scientist look rather than the German infantry look that the figure was originally intended for. This was easily accomplished with a simple head-swap & painting the great-coat into a lab coat! My wife approved (which is good since she bought me the figures in the first place) and says he looks like Dr. Nefario from "Despicable Me".
Here's the whole group together. All finished in one weekend! (that's a record for me)
OK gang... got a decision to make on where to go next. It'll be probably at least two weeks before the replacement part for my ork megadread shows up... so I have to pick another project. In digging through my FW bits (which I'm guarding jealously)... I have the following to choose from.
A grot megatank...
an ork kill blasta tank...
an ork kill bursta tank...
or "Da Red Gobbo"...
I also have a second big squiggoth and three custom made (by Littletower) grot tanks... but since I just finished similar projects I'm not looking to repeat them quite yet. I ALSO have a fantastic custom-built landing pad by Cam, but I want to knock some of these units out of the way before working on a fortification.
Everyone is welcome to chime in. What would guys like to see? Make it quick because I've got to decide on a project quickly.
Those look great, Gits! And so quickly too My favorite is Iggy- Love the eyes! Dok turned out amazingly well, too. I'd have thought that was exactly what the kit was made for!
As far as the next one.... Yeah I think one of the Kill tanks. Blasta'd be my choice, but the Bursta is still wonderfully orky.
Oh... and this came today. Don't open the spoiler unless you want to weep. Buddy helped me get it for "painting credit", so I won't be working on it until I'm able to pay his half off (which is why it isn't an option for the next project).
Maaaaaaaaaaaaan!!!! The new addition to your army is getting me excited... I just can't WAIT till you can get your mitts on him!!! Its such a huge and pretty model...
OK gang... we're in the final minutes of the "Choose my next project" competition. Voting is close!
Grot Mega Tank: 9
Kill Tank: 7
Red Gobbo: 1
Automatically Appended Next Post:
OK, thanks everyone for the input... Grot Megatank it is! For those of you who voted for the kill tanks... don't worry, they won't be too far behind. I want an ork super-heavy to play with.
I've unpacked the megatank. Oy! Going to be fun though. Have at least one surprise I want to try and work out for you.
Great work on the bombs and I love the scientist controller ork (where'd the parts come from again?).
I'm late for the voting (I've been busy), but I shall vote anyway for the ork kill blasta tank. Not seen one of them before and I've seen the others, so it get's my vote.
@Dr H: The parts come from a Polish company called Kromlech. Really nice bunch of guys to work with and their sculpts are excellent. The head came from a different company... but I can't for the life of me remember which one.
I'll add you into the tally for the SH tank, no problems. You won't have to wait long.
I have this original Epicast ork stompa. This is a really old, solid resin piece from wayyy back in the day. It's far too small to represent an actual Stompa now... but it's just about the right size to be a morkanaut or gorkanaut. Problem is mine has two gun arms. Now I've been searching the interwebs for a long time to see if I can pick up one of the chainsaw arms that was an option on the original model... to no avail. So I finally broke down and bought a mork/gork claw arm from a bits dealer on e-bay. It'll need a bit of converting to make it look right (and it won't be exactly right as I don't want to destroy the original model in the conversion). Unfortunately the layout of the old stompa model is a lot closer to a gorkanaut than a morkanaut (which is really what I want)... so I'm not sure what to do about that. I'll have to experiment like any good mek.
Silly Git, should have made one, or asked Mekboy Cam to. Just need a pic. However, show us what you are playing with! Not really been following GW bits, whats the difference between a Gorkanaut and a Morkanaut anyways?
I've used the good will and talents of my friends far too often already.
Here's a comparison. I know it's just a photo on the box but I know the measurement of a built gorkanaut and it's roughly the same size as my epicast stompa.
What I'm wondering is that sometimes these old models can command a decent price on ebay. I could strip it and see what I could sell it for. I'm not as attached to this one even though it was purchased back when these were originally offered. Then I could use the money to help subsidize an actual gork/morkanaut.
As much as I've seen original Epicast/Armorcast models go for on Ebay, I think you might be able to out right buy a Gorkanaut/Morkanaut (maybe 2) with the funds.
Sell it to a collector Gits! someone will snap that up quickly. I found an unopened Michael Schumacher & Barrichello lego podium the other day and I just googled prices.... :-) I think you'd be happy as well.....
It looks like the conversion shouldn't be too difficult. The arm joint looks to be fairly simple in construction. Depending on what the new part looks like at the shoulder, it could just be a stick on job with some scratch-built plates, braces and cables to tie it all together as to your taste.
Only thing it's missing is a door to allow the occupants of the Mork/Gork in and out. That could be deceptively complicated to do, or as difficult as you make it.
Izzy, Bizzy and Doug are very cool, and the dok/controller is excellent, the head swap and white coat make a world of difference to the look.
Looking forward to seeing the mega-tank, should be a lot of fun.
Pesonally, I'd be chopping into that old stompa to creat a unique gorka/morka-naut. But the sensible option probably is to sell it off and buy several goodies with the cash.
Well, I've already bought the bits for the conversion. I'll wait until they come in and make a judgement about the suitability of them before I make a decision.
I would always go for the glorious retro conversion myself. Think of the possible workarounds! However, the bits haul from leftovers if you bought the kits is jolly tempting.
Either that or I might be able to roll the money over into an actual stompa, which would be fun.
I'm torn on it. I'm afraid converting would be an extensive enough project that it would in effect "destroy" the original model... which is a shame to do as there can't be too many of them left. On the other hand I guess it's not my job to preserve 20 year-old models for posterity, so why not? In any case I'll see what the bits look like in relation to the model first. They should be here fairly shortly.
I look at it as my chopping up of old models for my own projects means that I'm increasing the value for those who see their projects as preserving them
Save or sell it. leave the love for the collector. Once chopped it'll lose its real value. Once chopped it'll only have value to you or a odd buyer and never at the collector price.
Lastly.. it 's yours to do as you will.
I'd say sell, myself. Granted, I'm not the sort to be nostalgic for old models, since they're almost always lower quality and more goofy looking- goofy's all well and good, but I'll leave that for cartoons- unless you're going to not paint it realistically and instead paint it like a cartoon.
But yeah, for stuff that's out of production, which during its lifetime was chopped and mutilated and converted all to heck so that years down the line it's actually worth more than you bought it for? Sell it to a collector. Those sorts of things should be preserved, so that when cheap personal reproduction comes along, the sculpt can be scanned, shared and printed out to do with as you will forevermore without worrying about losing the original.
Finally had my first chance to work on something gaming related late last night. Began the process of building the grot mega tank. It'll be a tricky wicket as I've got to figure out exactly what I can build before painting and what needs to be painted first, set aside and then added later. However, I did get enough done to give you guys a good scale shot.
Well, I have several ideas. One is to follow a historical example and actually try and make it look like a battleship (in greys), then put a bad-moon flag on the mast... maybe with some flags (as when the ships were on parade) trailing from the mast to the deck. The insane part of me then wants to replace the existing deck with a wooden one... primarily because it would give the basic model more interest.
The next version would be to go with a WWII style dazzle color scheme... basically a series of geometric shapes on the hull in order to disguise the ship's silhouette so it would be harder for the enemy to identify.
The third option is to go full out Bad Moon (after all it is the flagship of the fleet), all yellow with black triangles and such.
All three options sound good. I like the third one best to be honest.
You did make me google WW2 boat camouflage though. I never new there was such a thing. There's some really bizarre stuff out there! I always thought they were just boring grey.
Like the idea of it being bright yellow, but would it be a bit much with the squiggoth!
Don't like the the bland idea, she is a flagship after all.
I do like the idea of the bright geometric shapes, you could combine this with the Badmoon scheme, and have the yellow panels with the black detailing!
I am sure of one thing, it will be epic by the time you are done.
Go all out with wooden deck and ww2 boat pattern. :p Then hoist the yellow flag, ahoy!
Er... yeah. I am biased.
As for the stompa, I would sell it. Though you do have the talent to make it truly unique and it would make your army that much better, as who has one of those just lying around, you know?
I think I can do a decent dazzle scheme in yellow and black. Base of yellow with very large triangles and squiggly triangles & checkered patterns laid out in such a way that it makes for a dazzle-like pattern. (thanks for the correction on the term Ramos) I should be able to pick out the details well enough with some edge highlighting. Of course they'll be a lot of weathering and chipping too which will help sort the image and details out appropriately.
OK gang... here's the build prior to painting. There are a LOT of bits and parts missing yet & all the turrets are going to come off & be painted separately... but I think this is the best I can do without all the parts getting in the way.
Looks great, really chunky. Not to late to the party, but dazzle yellow and black also has overtones of Tranquillity camo which is just too appropriate for you go for it I say. Sticky wicket, mind you.
Well... you guys should expect that I just can't do this straight... Let us sum-up... the mega-tank itself looks like a WWI battleship or dreadnought. Check! The paint scheme chosen is one used in WWI & WW2 ships. Check! This is the point where the Gitsplitta P&M Railroad (or the GP&M for short) goes right off the tracks.
Spoiler:
I... having in essence the mind of a grot myself... decided that a bunch of piraty gretchin were a hell of a lot more fun than a bunch of stodgy German-looking gretchin (I can say this because I am of German heritage and think pirates are oh-so much more fun!) So, I decided to populate my battleship with diminutive buccaneers! This involved a lot of mucking about and kit-bashing whatnot... which of course I thrive on. Here's what I came up with.
First... the Captain. I figure a grot rich enough to have his own battleship is more than rich enough to have a grotty PK. This is, in effect... the grot version of the IG tank commander classic... "Drive closer so I can hit them with my sword!"
Second... the First Mate. The Cap'n thinks his Mate is getting a bit too big for his britches, so gave him a "place of honor" in the bow of the ship.
Third... well, every good pirate ship needs a lookout. The added bonus is that it makes the mast stupidly tall.
Lastly... the loader. "Cuz dem gunz ain't gonna lode 'emselves!"
That's a great plan! I have to say that the one thing this needs is to be crawling with crew, IMHO. Do you have the old Rackham goblin pirates? They'd be awesome, too.
interesting to see how you faired vs daemon/zombie, actually sounds like you coped ok under the circumstances. I understand the grot frustration - they should be daft, but not pointless. A good read!
