This blog was originally created to covers progress for my Imperial Guard army, the Ragnarok 1st "Einherjar" Regiment. As of 2015, now also covers my Eldar army, Craftworld Tian-Bing and Dogs of War army, Solland's Ghosts. As of 2017, Kingdom Death : Monster became a major new project that I've been working on. And of course, I also share miscellaneous hobby such as Gunpla, Flames of War and other scale models are included here as well -- basically anything that I spent hobby time on.
PROJECTS
Kingdom Death : Monster
Late 2012, I backed the original Kingdom Death : Monster KS, but held off on actually building the pinup girls, then core game. When the 1.5 KS was announced, I ended up selling my 1.0 box to fund a hefty upgrade to 1.5. Mid-October, 2017, I received my Kingdom Death : Monster 1.5 core game box, and started building.
As of mid-2018, progress is coming along pretty well, with all of the Core Narrative Survivors built:
Aside from the Phoenix, all of the Monsters are built, along with the Core Narrative Survivors, the Green Knight Armor Expansion Survivors, and the Echoes of Death Survivors. And of course, I've built a couple pinups. I've got the basic plastic built, but have yet to start gap-filling and painting. I also have a number original Expansions that I will be getting to, once I get Survivor storage "problem" squared away.
As of 2022, the Phoenix is built! So many little hands. LOL Still waiting for the Gambler's Chest to arrive, though...
Tian-Bing is a militantly resurgent Craftworld, whereupon Aspect Shrines predominate and all Craftworlders are expected to traverse the paths of the Warrior several times over. Tian-Bing works to recover Maiden Worlds against Imperial and other forces, sending large numbers of Rangers offworld to discover and scout such worlds. Like any large Craftworld, Tian-Bing fields Ghost Warriors in major engagements, Wraithknight spearheading massed Wraithlords. Tian-Bing also possesses a limited numbers of grav tanks and war walkers for additional fire support.
On the tabletop, this means I can generally field multiples of nearly anything in the Codex, including many of the more exotic formations; however, my tastes lies with the 2E Goodwin-sculpted Aspect Warriors which overwhelmingly dominate my Craftworld forces. Latest inventory in 2015 has me at an excessive 300+ Eldar models, 95+% foot-sloggers.
In 2019, work here was put on hold, as I should actually reduce the army. I simply didn't need huge masses of secondhand Aspects that I will never get around to repainting. *sigh*
Ragnarok, on the far fringes of the Imperium, is orbited by the Forge Moon Nibelungenwerke. Ragnarok is a temperate world, with lush, fast-growing vegetation covering much of the available landmass. The people of Ragnarok are industrious and hardy, practical and efficient. The Ruling Houses in the Hive are generally competent, as failure is punished with public, permanent consequences. Nibelungenwerke is fortunate in having a STC core that provides effective basic weaponry and systems; however, several of the more advanced elements are either missing; corrupted and unusable; beyond the abilities of the Tech Adepts to implement; or simply too resources-intensive to acquire and prepare. Nevertheless, Knight Titans and Grand Knight Titans are possible, albeit expensive.
From a practical standpoint, this means that I have an entire world to raise my Regiment from, and they can have pretty much anything that I care to build or convert. My tastes run toward late-WW2 German armor, and conversions abound. Late 2014 inventory has force level at 150 infantry and 25 armor. Closing out 2018, I've somehow grown things to 190 infantry (Imperial Guard & Stormtroopers), plus a dozen Hive Gang Militia, excluding Inquisition forces and Sisters. *sigh*
In 2019, I set out to complete assembly of the metal stuff, and basically completed that of mid-January, aside from a few things that need to be pinned. Later this year, I'll get the new stuff primed and basecoated.
As of 2022, I've thinned the herd and sold the excess. The Baneblade that I had intended to build as a custom Shadowsword ended up being built as a custom Baneblade with a removable superstructure, so I could always swap it for a custom Shadowsword insert.
"Solland's Ghosts" Dogs of War
Solland was the southernmost Empire province before being overrun by Orcs. Homeland lost, many Sollanden became mercenary soldiers of fortune, working with former countrymen and recruiting other outcasts as Dogs of War throughout the Old World. They are not a large force, but well-varied with Pike, Crossbow and Cavalry at the core, supplemented by duellists, halflings, and dark elves; they even call upon exotic dragonriders and giantmasters.
I am a big fan of the high Gothic elements in Fantasy, and have a number of substitutions, such as Familiars for Halflings and Dark Elves for Crossbowmen. Beyond some mundane conversions for my General, Paymistress, and Wizard, I also have converted Keepers of Secrets for Giants of Albion, and converted non-Winged Nightmares for Golfag's Ogres.
In 2019, pushed to complete assembly of my Dogs of War, assembling Leopold's Leopard Company (22), more pikemen for Ricco's Republican Guard (+11), rebasing a couple excess Wizards as Inquisition henchmen. I started conversion of the Nightmares into Golfag and another Ogre, and got both playable. I still have 4 pikemen to build with repaired pikes for my Republican Guard, along with a Dragonrider before the army is done, but the bulk of the army is well and truly done. "Final" inventory and comes to something like 3500-4000 pts..
Wissenland / Nuln Empire
Having Empire as my other Warhammer Fantasy army, it counterpoints my ex-Sollanden Dogs of War. My Empire forces naturally come from Wissenland, which eventually absorbed the ruins of Solland, and it's Elector status within the Empire. Fortunately, Wissenland includes Nuln for the Artillery I've had since WFB6 released, along with plenty of gunpowder for all of the Handgunners I built in 2019.
In 2019, I finally got my Empire army planned out. It's deliberately distinct from my Dogs of War, so Handgunners or Archers, NO Crossbows; Halberdiers, Swordsmen, or Free Company, NO Spearmen. Cavalry & Artillery, but NO Monsters, so NO Pegasus, NO Dragon. Warrior Priests & Greatswords, but minimal Magic. I got the bitz sorted, and began assembly: 36 Handgunners and 20 Halberdiers completed.
As of 2022, it will be a Wissenland / Nuln army. There are a couple dozen WiP models TBD: Halberds and Militia. Also to rehab the cavalry: as the Knights Encarmine use a Tilean mounted dual-sword fighting technique, they're a natural 'count as' Knights of the White Wolf.
KOGlight is a 1/144 tactical battle game for armored "Knight Operations Gear" battlesuit mecha. It's an ultralight-weight hyper-streamlined wargame that uses Heavy Gear miniatures to simulate near future battles in Eastern Europe. Rules development started in 2015 and "finished" in 2017. If you're sick of overcomplicated wargames with 100s of pages of rules, check it out!
Progress has been spotty, as it appears I took more than a little time off from reporting what little progress I'd made. Nevertheless...
2014 progress
As noted, when I originally opened this blog back in 2009, I had been working at my Imperial Guard off and on a decade, before giving up in a huff. In 2014, I realized that Imperial Guard had become my primary playing army, supplanting my Eldar, so it was time to get things playable and basecoated. That summer, I built, primed and basecoated a large mass (roughly 100) of Guardsmen to get them bulk painted and technically playable - that was very satisfying. I'll worry about painting camo later (yeah, I really dug myself into a hole here).
2015 progress
Over the course of the year, I've been getting my Shadowsword squared away - this is a conversion that I've been mulling for ages, and I'm quite excited over how it's turning out. It's a much lower-profile vehicle than standard build, with better-sloped armor. Temporarily on hold due to Codex: Eldar having some very shiny stuff. But still plugging away with rear track guards & covers.
More recently, I got and converted up an Eldar Wraithknight for the Summer "Apocalypse" game. Given that I'm not sculpting, just working with the bitz in the box, I think it turned out quite well. The actual game was a lot of fun, and I like the new Eldar Codex.
With Age of Sigmar out, I'm switching over to Dogs of War as we return to Fantasy after a 4+ year hiatus. First up on the plate is getting Leopold's Leopard Company playable! Then, to reorganize the storage boxes into something more sensible and orderly.
With the long-awaited arrival of Kingdom Death : Monster, it'll be time to build some very fancy minis!
2016 progress
This year, I did a little more work on the Shadowsword...
I finally built my share of Flames of War, reducing the content in the Closet of Shame. The German stuff that I've been tasked to build looks pretty good, totally reasonable for 1/100 scale, and the game itself works OK!
In 2017, I'd not done much modeling work at all, due to continued work on rules development and actually playing. However, with the release of Kingdom Death : Monster, I've restarted production and built several models! I built a cybertank from on Ogre Minatures.
For 2018, I mostly worked on Kingdom Death : Monster to assemble:
* Intimacy Couple Survivors (2) from the Core game,
* Screaming Antelope, King's Hand & Watcher from the Core game,
* White Speaker, Twilight Knight & Dragon Sacrifice
* Green Knight Armor expansion set (2)
* Echoes of Death set (4)
I also built a RMS Titanic with my son, and did a bit of 3-D modeling of a drone racercar in TinkerCAD. To close out the year, I did a little work on my Heavy Gear CEF models for KOG light, and assembled the sponsons for my IG Shadowsword conversion.
2019 progress
In 2019, I set about cleaning up my metals, starting with my Imperial Guard. I assembled the vast bulk of the unbuilt metal Imperial Guard, =Inquisition=, Sisters of Battle and Necromunda models, aside for a few models that would require pinning. In getting things squared away, I inventoried my Imperial army and found it grew to 200-odd Guardsmen / Stormtroopers / Gangers / Spyrers backed by 40-odd Sisters & Inquisition; however, selling various unbuilt model kits actually brought the total points value down by a fair bit.
In 2019, I stepped away from miniatures and refocused on other pursuits, placing the blog on indefinite hiatus. I continued to sell things that future me wasn't likely to get around to dealing with.
2020 & 2021 hiatus
During 2020 and 2021, I continued to work on other things, and sold off even more future projects that I deemed unlikely to work on. At some point, I finally finished the long-running intended Shadowsword conversion as a Baneblade variant using what was left in the box.
2022 return
In 2022, I've come back, and am building GIANT ROBOTS!
This year (2009), my primary gaming resolution is to complete buying, building, and painting my Imperial Guard "Ragnarok Einherjar" army.
I've been working at my Imperial Guard off and on for the better part of a decade. With the pending release of the 5E Guard Codex, I'm going to make a big push to finally complete this army.
One of the big challenges is that I've made this pretty difficult for myself:
- roughly 120 Guardsmen, currently about half painted in jungle camo
- all converted Tanks
The only real saving grace is that I use the fixed pose metal Tallarns as the basis for my army, and that I don't convert those models...
So going forward, any adds require camo paint jobs and tank conversions to match existing models.
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Goals
1. All Guard infantry prepped, primered, basecoated, painted, and based
2. All Guard vehicles built, primered, basecoated, and painted
3. All Guard superheavies built, primered, basecoated, and painted
Spoiler:
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Major Tasks
1. finish building existing stuff
2. buy & build new releases
3. PAINT!
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Total 150 dudes, of which 71 need painting, after 6 MLs and 13 specials have their barrels drilled.
28 vehicles to paint, and nearly all will need some work (build / convert / reconvert).
2 superheavies needing to be built
@randomfrog: That's going to be quite a while from now, but if you want to get an idea of what they'll look like, you can click on (WWW) to get to my Fotki site...
Expect to see a lot of jungle greens!
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Since the last update, I've made a little progress:
I'd try and compete with the building if it wasn't for the fact that I'm building an Elysian Army and don't have as many models as you two. Should get my camera and take some pics and do a blog anyway though.
And I'm right there with you Howard on the cost of FW stuff. Spent $600 for my first batch of Elysians (61 men + 2 Sentinals) Next installment will be about $300-$350 and be another 30 men and a Vulture.
Not to turn this into an Army List thread as I know it's a modeling blog, but I've been in a conundrum with my own IG army as to which heavy weapon to give each squad. Without knowing what 5E is going to look like, it's kinda hard to tell what HW loadout with be best. Consequently, I'm kinda spinning my wheels.
I see that you've resolved that issue by solely using MLs. Interesting decision!
Howard A Treesong wrote:Hi, I'll do a blog with you, and we can push each other along.
JohnHwangDD wrote:7. Base total 140 Guardsmen.
I'd love to do that many, but I've done the maths and 140 DKOK would cost nearly £500, I'm going to go for a more modest 50.
I'd like to see a pic of your Trojan when it's done.
Awesome. It's good to blogs this way.
At current GW retail prices, I shudder to think what my all-metal Tallarns and Storms would cost...
Though, when the plastic Storms arrive, that'll help considerably help your costs.
The Trojan is basically a tracked brick with a crane! (a sexy brick, but still a brick)
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Salted Diamond wrote:I'd try and compete with the building if it wasn't for the fact that I'm building an Elysian Army and don't have as many models as you two. Should get my camera and take some pics and do a blog anyway though.
And I'm right there with you Howard on the cost of FW stuff. Spent $600 for my first batch of Elysians (61 men + 2 Sentinals) Next installment will be about $300-$350 and be another 30 men and a Vulture.
For me, it's not about numbers and volumes, but simply driving toward completion. I think it'd be great for you to join in and also work at competing your Guard this year.
Believe me, as a metal Guard player, I understand your pain with FW.
When those plastic Valks come out, you may do better to convert a Vulture?
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Death By Monkeys wrote:I've been in a conundrum with my own IG army as to which heavy weapon to give each squad. Without knowing what 5E is going to look like, it's kinda hard to tell what HW loadout with be best.
I see that you've resolved that issue by solely using MLs. Interesting decision!
I think a mix of Heavies wouldn't hurt - if you use the plastics, then 3 Las, 3 ML, 3 AC, 3 HB, and 3 Mortars wouldn't be a bad start. I'm just hoping that ML costs will be fair when the new Codex arrives.
I originally went with MLs back in 3E because I liked the look of the models, and discovered that their "Jack of all Trades" utility is adequate for most games within the context of my army, so I stuck with them. I don't really need Lascannons due to the Demolishers and massed Meltas. Plus, I have plenty of Pie for hordes.
Besides, the metal Tallarn Heavies are awfully dated, while the FW resin Heavies are a little spendy...
What's funny, is that your 400 Tallarn are only about 2000 pts - the same as a company of 100 Marines.
That's precisely why I'm a treadhead.
I've got Titans planned, but first I've got to clear the Guard stuff out of the way. If I do that this year, maybe I can tackle a couple Warhounds next year. Though, I would love to hear that GW will make a plastic Warhound. GW does that, I'll buy 2.
I broke out my entire set of playable IG stuff, and started reshuffling models around, trying to decide on what the army configuration ought to be, and this is what I came up with (for 4E):
HQ
Colonel
Command Platoon - Sr. Officer w/ ML - 2x HWS w/ 3 ML - HWS w/ 3 Mortars
Armored Fist - Platoon Squad w/ ML & Plasma, Chimera
Fast
2x Hellhound
Hydra
Heavy
3x Demolisher 2x Leman Russ
Basilisk Griffon (count as)
Even with tight model-to-model (BtB infantry) and unit-to-unit (<2" coherency this had a footprint 36" wide, 24" deep, and doesn't include my Atlas or Baneblade WIPs. Add the stuff I'm planning to buy and build (2 Superheavies, 4 Sentinels, 3 Valks, and 4 more Tanks), and I'm going to need a bigger table in 2010 if I want to display it all... ____
Yeah, I'm pretty comfortable with scratchbuilding. I've gone through amount of sheet styrene in the process here.
Chimeras These are basically stock, the only trick is that I use the extra Griffon / Basilisk plate and set that up front as extra spaced armor. I use sprue to set the plate forward and add skids on the plate.
I add custom track guards out of styrene, and I don't bother with track on the upper runs where it would be concealed - this speeds assembly considerably.
I recut the Leman Russ Turret stowage to fit the back of the Chimera Turret. This helps immensly in bulking out the Chimera Turret. Also, I revise the turret gun mount, as I'm considering co-ax Heavy Stubber, depending on the next Codex.
I cut down the rear Lasguns, as I don't like their length.
The AF Chimera (in grey) with the Heavy Stubber is the original, and varies only slightly from the rest.
mini-Chimera This was based on trying to adapt the PzKw I/F to 40k, and basically sectioned 2 wheels out of the chassis, while narrowing the hull. It's cute, yes?
Griffon This is a Chimera with a custom box multi-rocket launcher. There is a scissors mount for the box, and if I had injection plastic technology, it would work...
I probably ought to add transport cover plates front and rear, but the army concept works fine without them.
Leman Russes I wanted Russes but hated the Shermanesque designs. I reconcepted them as SPGs following the JagdPz 38t "Hetzer" after seeing the FW Destroyer / Thunderer conversion kits when they first came out.
I keep the tracks and side plates to define the basic chassis, but reverse the lower hull plate to remove the bullet trap.
I build a custom upper superstructure that allows me to use the gun mount and engine cover as decorative bitz.
The mk.I version has the Trench Rails and semi-riveted hull, but subsequent versions omit this, as it's harder to build.
Subsequently, the gun barrel was replaced by styrene tube, after seeing that the FWDKoK Russes got thinner barrels.
Demolishers The basic chassis is identical to the standard Russ, but I build a custom upper superstructure with a recess for the Demolisher Cannon bitz instead of retaining the turret mount which is unneeded. I use GS to gap fill.
Also, I re-gap the barrel with plasticard to make it round, rather than oval.
After the AC article, I started to add side skirts to help remind that this is AV13 on the sides.
Hellhounds These are nearly full-scratch, starting with the Chimera, but extending the cab to mount a Turret ring taken from a Defiler cab.
The Turret is semi-scratch-built based on reversing the FW Artemia so the gun defaults to properly sitting along the centerline.
The rear deck is scratchbuilt, but is punched to carry the stock fuel tanks.
Hydra At this point, I wanted to add more Armored Company elements, so I mocked up a Hydra hull. I didn't like the FW design, as the turret is much too large. Instead, I took the Flakpanzer Gepard as the primary inspiration.
The Hydra Turret is very close to a full scratch, but is actually a near complete elemental teardown and rebuild of a Leman Russ Turret. I still need to gap fill this thing...
The twin long Autocannons use leftover Defiler Autocannon bitz that I had handy. If I could have gotten a set of new plastic Autocannons, that would also have been fine.
Basilisk This is still partly WiP, and is based on the Soviet 2S7 "Peony" SPG. Like the Russes, this is pretty much a Full Scratch Build.
The cab is pushed forward as the RL vehicle uses the mass of forward cab as a counterweight to increase the inertial momentum against dynamic recoil forces. Pretty clever design, actually.
As it is enclosed, I extend the cab backwards to where the gun would mount at the rear. So the notional interior crew space is huge.
I added a rear spade to dig itself in for proper recoil management. I still need to finish the hydraulics for this...
The barrel takes the necked portion of the stock Earthshaker and extends it with narrower styrene tube. I then added upper and lower recoil compensators. One challenge is that I need to mount the gun to the chassis, and pseudo-articulating this is a pain. Oh, well...
Anyhow, if you click on my [WWW] button, there are some more detailed pictures of many of the vehicles under 40k / IG.
There's some cool tanks! I like the well-thought out planning of all the tanks, makes them look like they were built by the same forgeworld. It's interesting that everyone seems to hate the basic hellhound; I like your take a lot, though I'm not convinced by the placement of the cannon. To each his own I guess .
FWIW, I probably spend a week on designing each tank conversion, which is why thy match up together.
WRT the Hellhound, the FW design has some strange design decisions, like the forward-opening cab, interference tank, and maximum offset gun barrel. However, the detailing is great and the concept is strong.
The basic GW Hellhound, is, of course, poo, because the conversion wasn't thought out very well. Clearly, it was just a slap-on for the existing Chimera, and it shows.
It's been a while since I've updated, because the coming IG Codex has severely dampened my enthusiasm for Guard lately. Mostly, it feels like an unnecessary nerf, and I've not been happy about it.
But then I came to the revelation that mostly this doesn't matter because I play Apoc. So I've focused on Apoc plans.
I've been working on detailed design for my Superheavy Company: counts-as Baneblade, Shadowsword, and Stormlord.
The Baneblade is pretty stock but substitutes a Mortar for the main gun - I just don't like that turret.
The Shadowsword is a tank hunter, and will mesh well with how my Russes are designed.
But the Stormlord has been a lot of work. The basic Stormlord layout makes no sense, so I've been trying to figure out how to package engine / transmission / transport / guns to make it work. It looks like a rational design is possible based on a mid-engined layout, with a custom-build rear transport. The LAV that I bought is going to do more donor work than I had originally guessed.
Anyhow, with the new Codex, I think I'm going to rearm some Chimeras from their basic Mult-Lasers to more impressive-looking Autocannons, along with the miscellaneous upgrades like spotlights and smoke, where they are included automatically. Depending on Bitz availability, I may re-gun some Heavy Weapon troopers. ____
... or not, as the new IG Codex doesn't have the option - only FW / Inquisition Chimeras will have the gun options. Suckage.
Aside from your awesome tanks, I like how you've got the balls to plop a Wehrmacht Cross on the side of one of your Chimy's. I personally wouldn't risk it (I fully support you in doing this) with the "HAI NAZI" brigade, but it's your choice.
Brilliant foresight and planning. I envy your army building.
Um, actually, the Iron Cross is going to be the icon on *all* of my armored vehicles, as the symbol my Mechanicus Forge moon "Nibelungwerke".
I don't see the Iron Cross as Nazi, as it predates and postdates the Nazi era by a considerable margin (starting with WW1 armor, then continued by the West Germans / current German Bundeswehr).
I do, however, very much like Panzers, and make no apologies for doing so. The Panzer design ethos makes sense to me.
The key point is that the Iron Cross is as far as my iconography is going to go in that direction.
I broke out the knives, files, and glue this weekend and started building a Valkyrie. This is actually a tremendously good kit.
Features are clever, with opening door, sliding doors, moving Heavy Bolters. Of course, these aren't the most robust things, so I'm going to button the kit up, and probably re-mount the HBs onto the hull...
Engineering is very good, with integral stops and guides. The Valk *wants* to build up square. And GW did a good job of hiding most seams and attachment points. This kit can build up very, very clean.
Scaling is the weakest point - compared to other 40k kits, the Valk is oversized by at least 25%. GW basicially made a "True Scale" Valkyrie for the Guard, and that's the biggest problem. If you were to shrink the dimensions by 20-25%, the kit would be far superior for playing and still look great.
Conversion options are rather limited. I'm going to attack the wing landing gears, because those things look horrible and destroy the wing line. Re-scaling the kit makes no sense - I'd rather FSB & cast in resin, which defeats the point of a plastic Valk in the first place!
Overall, this is one of the best kits GW has made, and I rate the Valk as a solid 8/10.
Oh, yeah, FWIW, I'm building a full squadron of 3 anti-horde Valks: Multi-Laser, Rocket Pods & HBs.
I got side-tracked and cut the Lasguns from 3 of my Chimeras, and I'm much happier with the cleaner look.
I need to do a little gap-filling / surfacing on them, along with bitz allocation. The lack of Lasguns makes room for much-needed stowage which no APC would ever be in the field without...
I've decided to go forward with the Plague Monks and have placed an order for them.
As a bonus, I get *free* tentacles of Slannesh, maggots of Nurgle, chains, & scroll bitz to use with my CSM!
(Plus, a couple of Wizard / Familiar models for my Dogs of War Fantasy army, assuming I ever jump back there... )
Tho I think I may need to buy some more 25mm round bases. I'm not sure I have 20 spare, especially as I also ordered Dryads to serve as generic Lesser Daemons for my CSM.
This is all excellent stuff. I want, no, need to see more. And ignore anybody who says anything bad about the iconography you use as they don't know what they're on about.
Per requests, here is a picture of a trio of Ragnarok-pattern Chimera-class Transports:
- track covers, standard
- additional spaced-armor glacis plate
- forward glacis-mounted skids
- additional turret-mounted stowage
- sealed weapon portholes
Pending refits:
- mount spare track, tools, gear and/or stowage
- swap standard multi-laser for something more like a chaingun
- swap hull Heavy Bolter for Heavy Flamer
With Space Hulk being the latest thing, I made 4 Sentry Guns modeled after the USCM UA-571-C designs:
- top-mounted video scope
- full-cased hardware
- drum ammo
- folding tripod
They are to support my Guardsmen when they need to clear a Hulk, and function as (move-or-shoot) Assault Cannons in SH; 1 AP to set up.
For 40k, I think I'll count them as Heavy Bolters.
I still have my old Halcyon model kit of the APC lying around in the battered half built state I left it in (I bought it as a kid so didn't build it properly or paint it at all).
I still have my old Halcyon model kit of the APC lying around in the battered half built state I left it in (I bought it as a kid so didn't build it properly or paint it at all).
...Dropship!
The APC is very doable as a scratchbuild, even without the nice Halycon kit (which I've always wanted).
The UD-4L Cheyenne Dropship? Way too hard for me to build, even with a Valk as a base... But hmm... The Valk is big enough to tak in this direction as a conversion. This is going to have to take some real thought...
The sentry guns looks cute , but i think the scopes can be changed to look less like a scope ( since its computer controlled )
And atm it doesnt look like it can swivel around
I've decided to go forward with the Plague Monks and have placed an order for them.
The Plague Monks came in, and they look like they're going to work very nicely. It looks like they'll stand about shoulder height, maybe less, compared to a 2E Guardsman.
@excessionary, I'm actually planning to scratchbuild a couple Aliens-flavored APCs, along with a Dropship. I've been working on detail design for a while, and it all looks very 40k-doable. Besides, $150 US for each kit is way more than I can afford to spend, when the scratchbuilds will be <$20 in materials.
It's been a while since I've had Guard on the mind, but lately, I've been noodling over the 5E Codex and thinking about what I'll have to play with. Removing the Inquisitional forces, this is what it looks like where I'll be going with my Guard army:
I just noticed that this thread is still linked in my .sig, so I'm gonna necro it to pick up where I left off.
2014 Year in Review
In 2014, I started, but stopped on a couple things that I had thought would be a good idea:
- converting Plague Monks as Psyker Battle Squads. I started the first model, and decided they wouldn't fit with the rest of the army. Fail.
- swapping Dark Elf Cold Ones for Rough Rider mounts. Turns out the DE COs are a lot skinnier than a WFB horse, so the RRs won't sit on them properly. Maybe I need to look at Saurus cav? I should sell these, or convert up new legs.
Sigh.
On the plus side, I made a big push to get my Imperial infantry models playable:
- cleaned, prepped and glued 70 infantry to bases
- primed 92 infantry black/gray
- basecoated 92 guardsmen green
My Guard has grown quite a bit since I opened this topic, and they are now a reasonably playable 200 strong...
On the side, I have 45 Sisters of Battle and 30-odd Inquisitors/Assassins/Retinue/Syprers for exotic support.
Very nice! I'm up to 250-odd infantry, but I have more tanks. When I get the rest squared away, I'll have roughly 2 dozen armored units. Lot of work there...
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OK, I just did a quick tally, and the "5,500 pt" force estimate is quite a bit out of date. Counting all of my stuff, including the DreamForge Leviathan Warhound Titan, I'm up to 7,000 pts of Guard goodness.
On top of that, add 2,000 pts of Inquisition forces and another 1,000 pts of Sisters of Battle.
10,000 pts of T3 Imperials and their vehicles? Yeah, I think that's enough for one man.
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I guess I'd best try to get a picture together of all the playable stuff. That should look pretty good!
On the Rough Rider standpoint, I ended up selling the Dark Elf Cold Ones, as they just weren't working for me. I need to look into Saurus Cold Ones, instead.
The past few days, I've been plugging away at my Shadowsword conversion:
Like my other "one big gun" tanks (really SPGs), this is going to be a low-slung project. As you can see, I've dropped the rear engine deck by quite a bit (about 3/8" drop), allowing for a very low profile silhouette.
Nibelungenwerke has been busy!
Next steps:
1. forward track covers, similar to how FW does it with their Arkurian-pattern superheavies.
2. rear track, likely embedding the fuel tanks.
3. "nose" superstructure, which will incorporate a proper ball-joined gun (with balanced counterweight breech!) for appropriate range of motion.
4. sponsons, hull weapons, and targeters (yes, the lascannon are "better", but they don't look as good).
____
OK, got the forward track cover extensions done tonight, and I like the look - the extra 1/2" makes the whole thing that much sleeker and longer and lower.
Rear track cover with integrated fuel tank? Ugh. WTF? Not a good design that lends itself to fixes...
Just like a squirrel on speed, my attention shifts to a new, shiny thing.
Specifically, the new, shiny 7E Eldar with their new, shiny Codex and a new, shiny Wraithknight. The new Eldar book is fantastic, and I'll be gearing up to play that this summer.
I spent the last couple nights inventorying my Eldar army, typing it up, and tallying the points: - over 300 Eldar models - over 8,000 points Craftworld Eldar - over 1,000 points Harlequins - plus minimum Dark Eldar Allies
Eldar inventory
Eldrad Ulthuan Asurmen Jain Zar Karandras Fuegan Baharroth Maugan Ra
1 Avatar
2 Farseers 6 Warlocks
34 Guardians w/ 2 AGPs
2 War Walkers
2 Falcons 1 Fire Prism +3 grav-tank hulls (unbuilt)
Harlequins 1 Great Harlequin 2 Solitaires 1 Shadowseer 2 Death Jesters 21 Harlequins
Dark Kin 1 Archon 10 Warriors
And after all this, still want a few more 2E metal Eldar (3 Warp Spiders, 2 Wraithguard & D-cannon) to fill out the various unit options I might want to field under the current Codex. Also, I should get some Jetbikes, now that they look good, along with a Vyper.
On the other hand, I probably don't actually "need" all of my Banshees and Scorpions - I can't see fielding that many units in the immediate future,
Over the Memorial Day weekend, I did a fair amount of work on the Shadowsword, prepping the roof plate mount/spacers, and reworking the entire "nose" of the tank to use the nicer, sculpted bits.
I roughed out an articulated gimbal cannon mount, but was unsatisfied with the bulk, so referred back to actual SPG cannon mounts for inspiration. This part is actually somewhat complex if I am to have realistic gun traverse and elevation vs. the static gun mounts that GW uses across their vehicles. I can scratchbuild something here that will look good.
I bought styrene tubing for the barrel, settling on 5/16" diameter, so it would be larger than the 1/4" diameter barrels of my Leman Russes. This is a compromise between realistic diameters and oversize GW diameters, wanting something that looks like a traditional long barrel high velocity cannon.
I still need to address the main glacis plate, to accomodate the Cannon, Gunner and Driver, so there has been some thought into what the whole thing should look like, including mantlet and so forth. Plus Commander, Loader and RTO. I'm glad I went with a much larger enclosed interior - they're going to need it!
As I mentioned elsewhere, I switched focus from old IG to new Eldar, and started building my Wraithknight:
I've got the hard stuff done, with the legs and torso squared away, pennies in the base, and both Heavy Wraithcannon for casual, friendly games.
OK, I'm actually gearing up for an "Apocalypse" game wherein S(D) toys are expected.
I still have issues with the T-rex arms, but I don't see myself resculpting them from scratch. I have a few more minor conversions in mind before I finalize him, specifically with the secondary armor plates being reshaped somewhat.
While it's not a bad kit, technically, the kit clearly isn't as good as a MG Gundam or 28mm Dreamforge Leviathan. There are serious joint clearance and capture issues that suggest the kit just wasn't designed properly to support full articulation and posing.
It is nice that the kit exists, I give GW credit for that!
I brought 2k of Eldar to the Big Game: Guardian Host, Aspect Host (Spiders & Reapers), and Wraith Host (Wraithguard).
The Wraithknight got to shoot, fight and Stomp! doing all of the things he was supposed to do, killing lots of enemy models.
Thing is, fielding him out there with my mixed color units and such, I wasn't feeling the unified Eldar army theme that I wanted. I kind of want to strip and repaint everything into a single unified color - pearl white armor across the board, with purple/yellow accents and amber/amethyst gems.
With Age of Sigmar releasing this week, I broke my Dogs of War out of storage and got in a game. I think AoS played nicely, and move to pure casual play has spurred me to start building and playing Fanasy again.
Classic and converted Dogs of War
playable - General
- Paymistress
- 3 Wizards
- Asarnil the Dragonlord (on Forest Dragon; unpainted)
- 2 light cannons (unpainted) - Giants of Albion (converted Keepers of Secrets)
It's a good-sized force on its own.
unbuilt - Borgio the Besieger
- 20 Leopold's Leopard Company
I'll be playing AOS this evening, and if I like it, I'll probably go forward with adding other items of curiousity, such as:
- not-Birdmen of Catrazza
- not-Beorg Bearstruck and his Bearmen
- not-hot-pot catapult
etc.
Servants of Malal!
In the future, I think I'd like to theme the army as Servants of Malal, with a new take on some classic Characters:
- Kaleb Daark, in Chaos Plate with Daemon Axe
- Heinrich Bors, Chaos Wizard
- Skrag, Ogre Maneater in Heavy Armor
As things move along, I'll probably want to convert a Greater Daemon of Malal
I traded some Empire for some DoW Pikemen (Leopold's Leopard Company), so getting those assembled and basecoated, along with the rest of my old DoW is the next thing on my plate of things to do.
I guess your work on this is pretty old now but, how did you make the scratchbuild Hydra? I really like the quad cannons and I'd like to make something like a Pantsir for my Russian-style force. Any tips?
RazgrizOne wrote: I guess your work on this is pretty old now but, how did you made the scratchbuild Hydra? I really like the quad cannons and I'd like to make something like a Pantsir for my Russian-style force. Any tips?
Yeah, those tanks were built several years ago, and the Hydra is probably the most complex of my scatchbuild models, based on what I remembered of the Flakpanzer Gepard from the early 60s.
Major assemblies were:
- Chimera hull, with scratchbuilt upper deck. The turret ring and base are from a Leman Russ. This part is relatively easy, as it's rectangular styrene card.
- twin-linked guns, using Defiler Autocannon bitz. I'd have used IGHWT Autocannon bitz instead, and a larger "box" at the base.
- main turret with bitz, using a Defiler torso knob as the tracking radar. This is tricky, as the body is from me carving up a "classic" Leman Russ turret and using that as the basis. There's a styrene rod that goes through to the guns, allowing vertical pivot in addition to the rotation to the sides.
Yeah, those tanks were built several years ago, and the Hydra is probably the most complex of my scatchbuild models, based on what I remembered of the Flakpanzer Gepard from the early 60s.
Major assemblies were:
- Chimera hull, with scratchbuilt upper deck. The turret ring and base are from a Leman Russ. This part is relatively easy, as it's rectangular styrene card.
- twin-linked guns, using Defiler Autocannon bitz. I'd have used IGHWT Autocannon bitz instead, and a larger "box" at the base.
- main turret with bitz, using a Defiler torso knob as the tracking radar. This is tricky, as the body is from me carving up a "classic" Leman Russ turret and using that as the basis. There's a styrene rod that goes through to the guns, allowing vertical pivot in addition to the rotation to the sides.
Thanks for your answer. I'll consider this when I'll finish my current projects. Congratulations again for your tanks, they come up very well.
And yesterday, something huge, dark and very heavy arrived:
Yep, that's my Kingdom Death : Monster core game that finally arrived after 33 months of (relatively) patient waiting. I'm kinda hot to get the starting models built up for the intro scenario against the White Lion, so we'll just see how that goes...
At this point, I'm officially in trouble for things to finish by end of year: - Imperial Guard' Shadowsword superheavy tank - Dogs of War' Leopold's Leopard Company - Kingdom Death' pinups & intro scenario models
It's been a while since I've had any hobby stuff to show, but I finally got the rear of my Shadowsword squared away with a low-profile fuel tank solution that doesn't raise the vehicle profile.
The I use the stock bit, but I recut the top so it doesn't sit so high up, and fill in the rear gap with plasticard and a single fuel barrel sitting low off the rear. I think it looks pretty "factory".
I added more track covers, because there would be mud, and the hull is now nearly a full inch longer than stock.
Now that the lower structure is done, I can go back to the superstructure of the beast.
Been doing a fair amount of modeling, but not for gaming -- lately, the guys have been excited over GunPla, so I helped them build a couple kits over the long weekend:
SD Blitz Gundam
1/144 MS-18E "Kampfer"
Old, non-grade kit, easier to build, and the kid is happy with it, so all good!
With the new IG formations, it looks like my IG might structure like this:
Command Battlegroup Command Company Command Squad (in Chimera?) 1 Lord Commissar I need a Standard, Ogryn bodyguard & Ordnance dude for a "proper" BGC CCS...
Core (0-3 per Command)
"Emporer's Fist" Tank Company 1 Tank Commander (in LRBT, w/ 2nd LRBT) 3 Leman Russ Squadrons (1 Demolisher ea.) 1 Enginseer minimum legal Core, due to me just not having the extra Russes to spare
"Emporer's Shield" Infantry Company nope. Even with my collection, I just don't have the uniformed Guardsmen to field the 170+ model ESIC. I can come pretty close if I reshuffle things around. But even if I could, I wouldn't - too many points for not enough effectiveness.
Auxiliary (0-3 per Core)
"Emporer's Blade" Assault Company 1 Company Command Squad (in Chimera) 3 Veterans Squads (in Chimeras) 2 Hellhound Squadrons (1 ea) I have Veterans, and like the idea of fielding what amounts to a Mech Veteran Platoon with attached Hellhounds for the ObSec bonus.
"Emporer's Shield" Infantry Platoon 1 Platoon Command Squad 5 Infantry Squads 4 Heavy Weapon Squads (HB, Mortar, 2x ML) 2 Special Weapon Squads (Melta & Plasma) 1 Conscript squad +1 Sentinel I actually have all of the squads and can convert up the Sentinel to make this work. This will be a minor priority, because it'd look kinda cool to field 100 Guardsmen on the tabletop. Worst case, I can break it down into a regular Infantry Platoon. Or two.
"Emporer's Wrath" Artillery Company 1 Company Command Squad (in Chimera) 1 Basilisk 1 Hydra (or Wyvern) 1 Deathstrike Missile Launcher 1 Enginseer It's not optimal, but it's a formation I'd consider to field from time to time.
Super-Heavy Support 1x Shadowsword w/ HKM, PMHS 1x Stormlord w/ HKM, PMHS I can field 2 of these! Or rather, I can pick one for flavor.
Unplayables This is stuff that I don't currently own the models to field, and the rules aren't really compelling me to buy more.
Spoiler:
"Emporer's Fury" Superheavy Company 3x Superheavy tanks I have the Shadowsword under construction (above), and plan to build the 2nd kit as Stormlord, having unloaded the planned Baneblade earlier in the year.
"Emporer's Spear" Aerial Company 3x Valkyrie / Vendetta Squadrons I have reserved my 1 kits to build 1 Valkyrie transport that I might swap as a Vendetta gunship, but I'm not going to get more.
"Emporer's Talon" Recon Company 2-4x 3 Scout / 3 Armored Sentinel Squadrons Sentinels will normally go into upgrading my Infantry Platoons into Emporer's Shield versions for the small bonuses, and 6 is more than I intend to own.
Ogryn Auxiliia 1 Commissar 2x Ogryn squads 2x Bullgryn squads I'll convert an Ogryn Bodyguard, because that'd be pretty cool to have, but S7 Hammer of Wrath just does not impress.
Psykana Division 1 Primaris Psyker 3x Psyker Squads 1 Commissar I planned conversions for 20 Pskyers, but this got put on the back burner. The biggest problem is that not so much that it requires the Primaris and conversion, but that it also requires a bunch of supporting models: Astropaths for each CCS, and a couple dozen more Daemons to maximize utility. Yes, I can stand in an Astropath, and yes, I own a bunch of the sexy Daemonettes; however, I'd have to buy some count-as Bloodletters and OOP metal Squids to make this work, and I have way too much on my workbench to consider at this time. If I should miraculously become super-productive, I'll reconsider this one.
1. inventoried my Imperial Guard, built and unbuilt, and was somewhat shocked to find I had somehow grown my IG collection from an estimated 5,000 pts of stuff by a whole tournament army up to a grand total of 7,000 pts. And I found out that my other T3 Imperials added another 3k pts of stuff. I had said I had enough, and yet, I ended up buying a painted unit of Last Chancers and some more Spyrers for my Necromunda count-as Inquisition forces. Oops.
2. I assembled my portion of the Robotech Tactics split! Like the time I spent assembling Sedition Wars, this was probably not a great use of my hobby time, as I don't really ever see myself playing the game.
3. I started work on my Shadowsword, with a fair amount of conversion work to tighten up the design. I re-built the nose twice. Right now, I'm still stuck on doing the custom superstructure and gun...
4. I inventoried my Eldar when the new Craftworld Eldar Codex hit, and found that I have something like 8,000+ pts of Craftworlders, 1,000+ pts of Harlequins and a smattering of Dark Eldar, bringing that total to something like 10,000 pts.
5. I assembled a lightly-customized Wraithknight and played it a couple times. Nice model, decent rules.
So, I started the year with IG and ended the year with IG, but took a bunch of detours for Robotech Tactics, Eldar and Dogs of War and Gundam. Built a Wraithknight, and got a Shadowsword in very rough playable shape. I also did a ton of wargaming that didn't require any creation / conversion work. And I wrote and shared initial rules for KOG light - a small, simple miniatures battle game that is taking an inordinate amount of time to get "right" for Beta release.
3. Realign models owned with models I might actually field by selling off a bunch of my excessive Eldar collection to plug some of the IG and Eldar formation gaps.
Of course, depending on what we decide to play, and what gets released, priorities may shift. But I gotta say, this boardgaming thing of just opening a box and playing is awfully attractive compared to building and painting.
Speaking of shifts, I traded off a bunch of unbuilt Imperial stuff and picked up an Imperial Knight Warden.
He'll probably sit for a bit, as I work my way through other projects, but it's a nice kit with a lot of options. I especially like the giant Power Fist, and wonder if maybe to model it holding a giant sword in hand..
Also, not entirely satisfied with the.pauldrons, wanting something more knightly, less beetle. Hmm... ____
Also traded off a bunch of stuff for more metal Dire Avengers.
This week, I've been helping build my half of the previous edition Flames of War "Open Fire!" set:
- 3 StuG III/G
- V-1 rocket & launcher
- Panzergrenadier company
- 2 PAK-40 & command
So far, I've gotten the StuG & V-1 stuff built, along with most of the infantry & cannon. I should finish tomorrow, and then there will be pictures!
Been busy playing stuff like Flames of War and haggling, so no hobby progress.
After playing a number of games of Flames, I was surprised to find that I like the idea of 1/100 WW2 gaming far more than I actually like the playing of the game when there is such a large disconnect between ground scale and figure scale.
With an Apocalypse game coming up next weekend, and a brand new Knight Titan NOS, I finally sat down and started building it. Not a huge fan of the mono-pose static legs, but I got those together. Then I started building the torso. Wow, it's like a 3-D puzzle to get all the things lined up and squared away. Now, it's like an egg on stilts.
Leaving the armor plates off, as I suspect this needs to be painted with the armor off for best results.
More progress, tonight, got a bunch of the greebling squared away, finished the top carapace, along with the head. Built the ion shields and missile launcher.
I added decorations and tacked on the armor plates tonight, so he's done and ready to hit the table tomorrow!
____
5/30 - having built and played the Knight, it's time to move on to the next thing, either back to the WiP Ragnarok-pattern Shadowsword, or the WiP Ragnarok-pattern Valkyrie. Hmm...
A couple notes:
1. Bird ain't done, yet.
2. I have a WiP Demolisher / Thunderer that's even older and not yet done.
3. I have a WiP Russ that'll be an Atlas that's even less started.
This is why I think any progress is good progress!
Mostly done as of tonight, now that the nose is assembled and Rocket Pods are attached:
I ended up filing down the rivets on the VTOL wing nozzles, as the just weren't coming out nicely.
The more significant conversion?
Yeah, I removed the boxes that go to the hugely oversized and ugly landing pads.
I need to scratchbuild some skids to go under the main hull.
For the Heavy Bolters and Multi-Laser, I'm thinking to remount the HBs where the ML would normally go, and then to remount the Multi-Laser in the nose.
Thanks! Still trying to decide on the landing gear and weapons.
____
ETA - got the weapons squared!
After tightening the nose to something slightly sleeker, I moved the multi-laser to the nose, slightly off-center like an A-10. For me, that entire dropped section under the cockpit is actually a belly gun evolved from a conformal weapon pod and subsequently integrated into the core airframe skin. I think it makes better sense than having it run parallel to the cockpit. Oh yeah, I'm using the Chimera Multilaser bit, because I think that one looks better than the thing in the official kit.
As nobody is using the HBs in the lists, and there's no obvious good way to mount them, I simply ignore them entirely.
Anyhow, those are the weapons.
Greeble-wise, I have the light pods since they're part of the iconic look, along with the nose tube. I moved the other bitz to the tail, to add some texture there.
Still need to address the landing gear, as this wants tricycle, I think.
Since my last post, I've gotten in a couple games with my Valkyrie.
Game 1 had plenty enough small Nids for it to score some very solid points, zipping around and shooting stuff up.
Game 2 had only big Sv3+ bugs on the board, and the Valk did basically nothing. Showing the obvious reason why people field Vendettas instead of Valks.
Still, it's a good model, and I think I'll model up landing skids under the main hull, rather than wheeled tricycle gear. ____
Uploaded a couple more pictures here, a close-up of the bayonet mounts that I used for my Knight's close-combat arms, and close-up of the revised Valkyrie nose. Enjoy!
It's October, and I have been busy actually playing games and working on other stuff (KOG light, kid's GunPla, etc.). Not a big deal.
During the run up to the Made-to-Order flash sale, I decided that I'd make my IG "formation" legal, and get the last models to fill in the blanks. Yeah, I know it's a huge marketing scheme, but it's not like I'd be buying models I don't actually like or want. I ordered both GW Techpriest Enginseers to dedicate to the Tank Company & Artillery Company formations. Later this year, I'll order the Regimental Advisors and Sister Hospitalier to complete my Command units. That'll leave me just one Sentinel short of all of the IG formations that I might want to field down the line. And I think I can convert one from all of the various IG bitz in my pile.
After that, it's time to reshuffle my IG models into actual formations and figure out how to visually organize the individual models into distinct units. Ideally, I could quickly and efficiently sort my entire pile back into the squads and platoons and companies and formations that they're supposed to be in.
I also probably need to knock together a "Remnants" Force of some sort containing all of the random rabble that doesn't just neatly fold into the predefined formations.
In any case, I don't feel bad that things aren't completely finished. Visible progress. Models played. And there's still a couple months on the calendar!
Exactly, any progress over no progress. Start of the year, Valkyrie wasn't playable, and I didn't have the Knight at all. Now, both of them can take the field! ____
11/3 - I'll be pulling the trigger to order the Regimental Advisors and Hospitalier! ____
11/9 - ordered! ____
11/15 - got them! The Sister Hospitalier is so delicate. Just lovely.
As I get the new Company Command Squad specialists together, I also ought to convert a Regimental Standard to go with the Medic, for completeness sake:
1x Medic (Sister Hospitalier)
1x Regimental Standard
1x Astropath
1x Master of the Fleet
1x Master of Ordnance
2x Techpriest Enginseer
I target to get them at least playable by Thanksgiving!
Note: I won't bother with Bodyguards, much less the even more overpriced and further underperforming Nork Deddog.
.
With a brand new Kingdom Death core set in hand, I've started building again.
I washed the sprues in detergent to get any mold release off and began building.
First model underway is the Kingsman. Got the legs on the body, and stopped to let it dry for the night.
Baby steps, as I've switched from Testor's gel (in the orange tube) to Model Master liquid with the metal tube applicator. Once I get a better feel for working with the stuff, I'll speed things along.
Mold lines are still almost nil, and the alignment seems near perfect. But the pieces go together with more fitting than I had expected. It feels a lot more like building something that was hand-sculpted and parted for resin, than something that was sculpted digitally and parted for plastic.
During my lunch break, I finished off my Prologue minis! Starting Survivors
White Lion
and the Kingsman from before
For how many pieces there are, the models go together really well, and are a really welcome change from building GW stuff. Very crisp, very precise. Of all the joins, only one was "difficult". It feels like I'm doing actual model building, rather than just snapping stuff together.
Next up is the Butcher, then the Young and Old Survivors!
Thanks! There are a couple pinhole gaps that will need to be filled, along with lots of sub-hairline joints that hopefully disappear with priming.
The photos were taken against a black T-shirt "edgeless" backdrop, with light photo processing to punch it up slightly.
I've been looking at things others have painted and am thinking a chiaroscuro approach would be best. Like Rembrandt, except I'm nowhere near as good as he was. But the models have a sort of feel to them, that they want to be warm and contrasty.
The Butcher went together pretty well, as did the Survivors. I particularly enjoyed building the Young Survivor - she's just gorgeous.
The Gold Smoke Knight was a nightmare, as I could not get it to build up clean and tight. It's going to require a fair bit of work to deal with the seams and such. Somehow, it got a little tweaked or something, and I just couldn't get it to line up the way it was supposed to go. Very frustrating. Good thin I won't deal with him for a while.
Hopefully the Intimacy / King's Man / Screaming Antelope instructions go up soon, as I want to build them more. However, right now only the Phoenix and Watcher remain as things that have their instructions posted. But all of that can wait, as my fingertips need to recover from squeezing various GSK parts together. If the Intimacy sprue isn't ready when I am, I'll tackle the simpler Watcher next.
Yeah, GSK was driving me crazy - he was just *so* close to being "right", and yet still being "off". I'm suspecting it's something of a general issue for everything that was hand-sculpted vs things that were digitally sculpted from the beginning, so I have high hopes for the GC and new Expansions, which appear to be largely digital sculpt.
I recently received Ogre Miniatures Set 1 from Kickstarter, and got around to building one of the 1/285-scale cybertanks!
Ogre mk.III in Hunter Green.
It's a few inches long, so I just may get around to dealing with the mold lines and such. The tool is a lot rougher than the Kingdom Death stuff, and it doesn't go together as nicely. It feels and builds like something from 20-30 years ago, which is appropriate, given the subject matter and publisher.
But it was fairly cheap, so there is that.
Aside, I did order the Ogre Miniatures Set 2, as a split, making things even cheaper.
Aside, aside - things got busy, so no more work on KD:M this year. Still prologue and more were built, and that's pretty good, IMO.
You say it assembles like a model from 30 years ago, but it looks like cover art from 60 years ago. I think that look was obsolete by the time Keith Laumer wrote the first BOLO stories.
JohnHwangDD wrote: Not so much. Still waiting on Hand and Intimacy instructions... Hence the "easy" TK build.
Yeah, I assembled the white speaker, twilight knight, Dragon King and his serfs and then tried the Dragon Armor kit and failed the Riddle of Forearms. Since then, I have been waiting...
Looking forward to seeing how you paint the Twilight Knight.
Instead of doing gaming miniatures, my boy and I built this:
Out of the box build of Airfix 1/700 RMS Titanic that we got on clearance. Not a bad kit, actually, although there are a few technical design issues that kinda irritiate me. Interestingly, it included paint and glue, but I didn't bother with that, as it's molded in color, and I have enough other stuff to work on.
With that big boat done, I got back to doing a little regular hobby work for Kingdom Death : Monster, replacing the hand on the Dragon Sacrifice's outstretched arm with a hand holding a sword. She's more fighty now, but I'm also kinda thinking that I should actually give here a Dragon weapon. Maybe I'll re-mod later.
Also, Kingdom Death : Monster finally hit the tabletop today, and we leisurely played through the Prologue and first Hunt - for how many things are in there, it moves surprisingly well. The battles and settlement are a lot of fun - it's very much like Mordheim, with a lot of strategizing over the Settlement.
Back to the hobby, I've started building the Screaming Antelope for Kingdom Death. We can hunt it, and probably will, once we compete a set of White Lion armor.
Core body was a little tricky to clean up, and the alignment isn't entirely perfect, as one would expect from something that was originally hand-sculpted as resin and scanned for tooling, rather than pure digital sculpt. Still, not a bad build.
I still need to do the ears and attach the model to the base. Looks like I'll need to pin the feet / ankles. ____
5/29 - found and attached the ears with a bit of fit work. Looks good, and I just need to address getting the model on the base.
It's beem interesting how the designs are a little hit-or-miss in terms of how they go together. Some build up beautifully and easily. Others need a bit of trimming for a clean build (e.g. Antelope). And one (GSK!) just refused to go together.
I think I will build the Intimacy Survivors and then look into priming them, along with the White Lion and Antelope. ____
Built the Intimacy Male, and got the Antelope on base.
That just leaves King's Hand, Intimacy Female, Watcher and Phoenix to complete the set of Core Narratives and Monsters.
I'll probably build them in that order, and get build photos up soon enough ____
6/2 - built King's Hand today, will tackle Intimacy Female and pictures later this week ____
6/3 - built most of the Intimacy Female, with a lot of web research to figure out a couple tricky parts (i.e. ribbon & feather). The model is *amazing*. I love the hair so much! ____
6/4 - finished the Intimacy Female. Pictures coming Soon(tm)!
The past couple days, I've been working on the Watcher.
It's not going as well as I'd hoped. This is another thing that started as Green Stuff, got scanned, and not totally cleaned up for plastic. The bottom isn't flush with the base, and all of the peg things need a fair bit of trimming to fit in their sockets.
OTOH, the 3-Dimensionality of the model is pretty cool.
Just more work trimming and filing than I had expected.
Thanks, it's just multiple overheads, and a very light contrast bump in post-processing.
____
More work on the Watcher today.
Getting the front and back halves to mate up cleanly has not been good. I think the conversion to plastic removed some "undercuts" that it didn't need to, so I ended up recutting them back for to "fix" them somewhat. In gluing the halves together, I could not get a "seamless" result, so some significant gap-filling will be required. I think it's a side effect of how the separation for plastic was done.
Anyhow, I'm going to stop for the night, let everything harden up before finally gluing it to its base, and then dealing with the little external bitz.
I'm just super glad not to have broken off any of the ropey lanterns. OMG. I cannot even imagine trying to build this in resin. ____
6/10 - Finished restoring physical undercuts, for actual shadow detail, and got the Watcher on his base. I just have to deal with the final 4-ish vines, and the model will be "done". ____
6/11 - noticed that one of the inner vines was rotated 90 or something, didn't look like the official model, so I removed it and will rework. Should have it all built this week, then on to gap-filling for the "small" models.
I finished the Watcher, got all of the vines squared away, and made a spot in the case. Done! Pictures will be up soon enough.
As I was going through the stuff, I realized I have a few more man-sized models to deal with, so my active to-do list looks like this:
* White Speaker
* Green Knight Armors
* Phoenix
I also have Lantern and Phoenix Armor Kits that I might want to build if/when the campaign should get that far down the line.
Anyhow, I plan to build those last few "small" models, get them all cleaned up before moving on to the Phoenix.
What with having to redo how one of the vines was placed, and the seam, and the undercut detailing, he was a lot of work. Looks pretty good though. Thing is, a 2-D photo really doesn't do justice to just how 3-D the model is, and how much negative space it contains - something that regular models just don't convey (or even attempt).
I started building the White Speaker tonight, and she seems to go together nicely.
OTOH, the base is ugly, and I'll need to address it at some point. Probably look into press mold or something ____
6/15 - wow, she has actual, individual molded true 35mm (1/48 scale) fingers on her hand, and it's not a slap or fist. I almost don't want her to hold the spear, just so I can admire the hand.
There's also a cape and a spear (which doesn't actually integrate into the model), but I the model looks better without them, so I decided they were optional parts, and called it done.
At the start of the year, I set a goal of building all of the Narrative sculpts and Monsters for Kingdom Death. As of mid-year, all of the Core game Survivors are built, along with the Dragon Sacrifice, Twilight Knight and White Speaker. Aside from the Phoenix, which presents some storage issues, all of the Core game Monsters are built. I just have the following to build: * Green Knight Armor Expansion Survivors [2], and * Phoenix Monster.
For the second half of the year, I intend to finish the loose Kingdom Death models as above.
Once those are done, I'm thinking to build Heavy Gear models: * Southern King Cobra * Southern Strike Cadre [5] * Southern Recon Cadre [5] * Southern Specialist Group [5] * Southern Arena Cobra * CEF Frames [9] They've been sitting for a while, so it'll be good to get them playable.
If the fancy strikes, I'll also be wanting to get the rest of my Warhammer Fantasy Dogs of War models playable: * Mengil's Manhide [10] * Leopold's Leopard Company [21] * count-as Captasus * count-as Ogre Low priority, but it'd be nice to get this off the shelf. ____
Observation - I also "need" a set of WFB5/6-era Dark Elf Crossbow to stand in as Marksmen of Miragliano
In lieu of actually building anything, I have been playing with a 3D modeler, and ended up getting a first cut at the design for my not Car Wars racer. Behold:
It was designed in 1/25 scale, but I would print a 2-up sample in 1/75 scale, to eventually develop as 1/150 scale playing pieces.
FYI, I've been working on the design and refining the details for several months, so it's not like I just turn on the modeler and this popped out. It's actually a very rough version of stuff I've been doing a lot of detail work on.
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I refined the forward wheel fairings. Rather than being composed of 2 shapes, they're now composed of 8 or 9 elements each. In addition, I did a bit of work on the leading and trailing wings, for a true aerofoil shape. And I make the wheels not suck! Plus, I rework the rear fairings into teardrops...
I've been playing a lot of PUBG mobile via the official Tencent Gaming Buddy emulator, and Season 3 has been a lot of fun. But I've been neglecting some of my hobby work if I want to finish the KD:M stuff this year, soo... back into the breach!
Today, I started building the Green Knight Armor female, using web reference pictures.
As it turns out, her 5-part skirt is kinda tricky to figure out, but really simple to build, once you understand *how* you're supposed to build it:
1. Assemble 2-part torso and legs. Let dry.
2. Attach legs to torso. Let dry. This forms the "base" for the skirt.
3. Assemble 2-part left skirt and 2-part rear skirt. Let dry.
4. Attach left skirt to waist. Let dry.
5. Attach rear skirt to waist and left skirt; attach right skirt. Let dry.
Yeah, that's 9 pieces in 5 separate steps, with a fair bit of fitting, mold line cleanup and undercut restoration at each step, and it gets things to here:
It would have been really helpful if someone had explained this and shown the picture earlier.
Vibrant Lantern is *way* off in how they describe the build - ignore that, because you can't save the legs until later. If you do that, the skirt pieces won't have the legs and waist making the precise base to attach to!
And yet, most probably wouldn't notice because, they're not going to be looking at the model from that direction. They'd see the front:
I assembled her shield arm and attached it, so that's 2 more parts assembled.
OTOH, Percival and Allison arrived, so the pile to do got a little larger...
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11/29 - attached the shoulder spike and glued her to her base. Also assembled her 3-part head.
11/30 - assembled & attached her sword arm (2 parts, plus separate sword hand, elbow & shoulder spikes = 5 parts total),
11/30- attached her head & shield hand! DONE!!! ____
The Green Knight Armor is a fiendishly complex build that really illustrates the differnence between GW and KD. Parts count: * 3-part Head, with separate helmet "wings" (3) * 2-part torso, with separate neck collar (3) * 2x arm, hand, upper arm spikes, elbow spikes, wrist spikes (5 ea) + shield (= 11 total) * multi-part skirt (5) * legs (2)
It's a 24-part model standing 35mm tall. TWENTY-FOUR PARTS!
GW would design that as no more than 10 pieces, but there would be infill and flattening, rather than negative space and undercuts
I've done a tiny bit of work starting on the male, to finish him before the end of the year before maybe tackling the Phoenix, although storage of that beast is something of a concern... ____
12/1 - got the male on his base, and with his arm & sword posed and drying.
After that, it'll be his other arm, shield, head & remaining detail bitz, and he'll be done!
Whew.
Thinking about it, these would have been far better as fixed-pose Narrative Sculpts, with "keyed" armor detailing to ensure "proper" assembly.
Anyhow, he completes the Narratives I had wanted to finish by end of year.
I still have the Phoenix to build, but I need to figure out how/where to store/display him before I build him, because I'm not building a model with a zillion tiny little hands without having a place to put it!
Nevertheless, I'm going to call 2018 a success.
New stuff!
In the Kingdom Death Black Friday sale, I added the following kits to the pile: * Echoes of Death - 4 generic fantasy-inspired Narrative Survivors translated over to Kingdom Death * Alison, Twilight Knight - female version of the Twilight Knight I got as part of the original Herald of Death bonuses * Percival - counterpoint to the Wave 4 Black Knight that I'll eventually receive
I'll be working on the Echoes minis next, so we'll see how far I get before the year ends. Heavy Gear and Warhammer Fantasy will wait for next year.
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ETA - I couldn't wait, so I opened up my Echoes of Death box, and started building the Thief. While I've just built the foundation (legs, hips & torso), it's a nice build, really clean from much better kit engineering. I'm looking forward to this being quick and easy. The only downside appears to be a slightly higher misalignment of the mold, requiring marginally more mold line cleanup.
Tonight, I finished building my Echoes of Death set:
Overall, I'm really impressed with the posing and design, with really dynamic poses that convey motion and energy, particularly with the Fighter. It seems like the figures are slightly larger, and that's definitely the case with the Fighter - it'd have been nice if she were about 1/3 head smaller.
In putting the new figures away, there are now only a couple spots left in my storage case, so I'm going to say that I'm "done" building Kingdom Death for 2018. Hail Victory!
To close out the year, I'll be looking into getting a bunch of custom foam trays cut, along with working on my Heavy Gear minis in the background.
I can't find my pin vise, so decided to work on more plastic stuff. I dug out the Imperial Guard Baneblade that I had started converting into a custom Shadowsword and got started by attaching both sets of sponsons:
I have no idea whether Extra Sponsons are good, and play so rarely, it matters not at all. But it looks better to my eye.
I feel that 2018 was an overall success in terms of hobby production.
1. Kingdom Death - At the start of the year, I set a goal to finish building the remaining Narrative sculpts and Monsters, which I consider completed. Only the Phoenix Monster remains unbuilt, as I haven't yet figured out how I'd going to store or transport it. I got in a few game sessions, and it's a really good game!
2. KOG light / Heavy Gear - I "fixed" my damaged Heavy Gear minis to play under KOG light. At the end, I ended up attaching the legs of 3 Fire Support Frames to their bases. No pictures, as they're early WiP. I stopped because I couldn't find my pin vise.
3. Warhammer 40,000 - Imperial Guard - I built and attached the sponsons to my Shadowsword conversion project. In addition, I finally sold off the actual Shadowsword/Stormlord kit that I had been holding on to for the past several years.
4. Warhammer Fantasy - Dogs of War - I ended up using an eBay coupon to buy the WFB5/6-era Dark Elf Command I needed for my Dark Elf Crosswbowmen to stand in as Marksmen of Miragliano.
5. other stuff - I built a 1/700 scale RMS Titanic with my son. I also designed a 3-D race car for my future not-Car Wars racing/shooting game. I came to the realization that this might be a dead end, as "realistic" movement is really hard to satisfactorily simulate.
2019 Objectives
1. Get metal cleaned and on bases! All of the 1-piece stuff should be playable.
2. Get the Heavy Gear minis assembled, so I can play broader games of KOG light. Buy that pin vise!
3. Get Kingdom Death storage sorted for Survivors and Monsters - I have a bunch of stuff to build, so I need to be able to store it all.
If I can do that, that'll be good work!
Hobby budget
The past few years, I have kept fairly detailed financials of my spend and sales, which has spurred me to sell more than I buy, despite spending pretty heavily on Kingdom Death. I intend to keep selling excess stuff, mostly as it reduces backlog and clutter, with a bonus of putting a little more cash in my pocket.
Back on the hobby wagon with my 40k Imperial Guard, finally assembling my Regimental Advisors:
* Astropath
* Master of Ordnance
* Officer of the Fleet
plus my Sister Hospitalier (Medic)!
Great models that have been sitting around since late 2016, but better late than never... That just leaves my Techpriest Enginseers to be assembled, and I'll be able to call my IGHQ assembly "done".
I only wish that the Hospitalier had been sculpted wearing a surgical mask instead of a gasmask, so that her chin could be finer, more pointed and feminine.
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ETA - finally got around to getting a tiny wierd model on its base! I'll post a picture later.
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ETA - I've been working on my Enginseers, and I now realize I need a "count as" Sanctioned Psyker. Hm.
In addition to the Enginseers, I put my IG artillerymen on bases, along with a couple Tallarn riflemen who broke off their bases, and a mysterious "familar" that probably nobody even remembers:
I have a trio of Escher girls stripping in the bath, so I'll get to work on them later. In the mean time, into the case the most recent batch goes. Done! ____
Argh. The Enginseers are so 3-Dimensional that they are too bulky to fit in the case. So I make a small box to transport them with my vehicles. Fitting.
1. Get metal cleaned and on bases! All of the 1-piece stuff should be playable.
As I was getting my Imperial Guard squared away, which has gone really well, it became clear that this is an army-by-army project. From easiest (OOTB) to hardest (conversions), it looks roughly like this:
GW Daemons of Chaos * assemble Daemonettes of Slaanesh [10]
Heavy Gear as detailed earlier, requiring pin vise to really assemble properly like many of the conversions.
Interestingly, as I lay it out, it actually looks less daunting than I had imagined. Selling off the bulk of my unbuilt stuff has done wonders to limit my to-do pile.
Of course, the above list conspicuously omits my 2E Eldar, of which I have too much and need to slim down before doing any building.
@Bob - Thanks, they were tricky to build with the ball socket for for the Servo Arm, but really cool. I love the detailing. Those two on the right are just ordinary Tallarn Guardsmen firing their rifles. It's a relatively rare pose. I have a lot of dudes that need to be primed and basecoated, but at least they're finally assembled. By end of year, I intend to get a BIG group picture of the entire lot. ____
Also, this morning, I got the Escher cleaned and on bases, along with a couple Malcadons that have been sitting for ages: Yeah, a couple of the models are "armless" and need bitz to be playable. It's unfortunate that I might not have the extra pair of metal SM Terminator Lightning Claws that would be ideal for the Malcadon. I may have to hunt for them.
I'm feeling really good to see so much stuff finally playable instead of being bitz.
As of early 2019, this is likely my "final" Imperial Guard configuration, as I do not intend to buy anything further for the army. The organization is based on formations, which provides me with plenty of options to choose from.
Battle Group Command Regimental Command Squad with Medic & Advisors in Chimera
Lord Commissar
'Emperor's Blade' Assault Company Company Command Squad in Chimera
- Tallarn Veterans with Plasmaguns in Chimera
- Tallarn Veterans with Meltas in Chimera
- Cadian & Van Saar Vets with Flamers & Melta in Chimera
- 2 Hellhounds
'Emperor's Shield' Infantry Platoon 1 Platoon Command Squad with ML & Commissar
3 Tallarn Squads with ML & Plasmaguns
1 Remnants Squad with ML & Plasmgun (Cadian & Last Chancers)
1 Escher Squad with Heavy Stubber & Plasmagun
1 Heavy Weapon Squad with MLs 1 Special Weapon Squad with Plasmaguns
[1 Sentinels]
'Emperor's Fist' Tank Company 1 Command Tank
3 Demolishers
1 Leman Russ
1 Techpriest Enginseer
'Emperor's Wrath' Artillery Company 1 Company Command Squad in Chimera (Cadian)
1 Basilisk
1 Hydra
1 Deathstrike
1 Techpriest Enginseer
Auxiliaries 5 Stormtrooper Squads
1 Valkyrie
1 Shadowsword (WiP)
=Inquistion=
Inquisitors with Retinues
Assassins
Sisters of Battle
Looking at everything in their storage transport boxes, it's basically the same as what I planned waaay back at the very end of 2015, but it did get reshuffled a bit as I decided what I would keep. While I was shuffling everything around, I entertained a notion to make the Mechanized Infantry all-Cadian, along with the Artillery Command, using Mordian models for the Regimental Command. That'd look pretty sharp, except I'd be right back where I was with dozens of incomplete minis. And the minis are OOP, which is inconvenient. So no. I stuck with the plan for what I have, and didn't add to the pile or to-do list! The only model I'm still considering to get would be an OOP Tallarn Lieutenant, for completeness.
Tallying-up
I then tallied things up, something I've not done in years, and it turns out that I've only got 9,000 points of T3 Imperials if I include the Knight Titan and Leviathan Crusader. The ~800+pt drop is because I've sold off the NiB Vendetta and Shadowsword that I'm just not going to bother with, along with 3 excess squads of Guardsmen that I don't need because I won't play them.
To-do
Looking it all together, I ought to convert up the following:
* CCS Regimental Standard Bearer & Orgyn Bodyguard
* 1 Scout Sentinel & 1 Armored Sentinel
Heraldry & Insignia
Once everything is built, there's a lot of painting ahead. There's a question of assigning insignia paint schemes for each "level" of soldier:
* Regimental Command
* Company Command
* Platoon Command
* Veteran Troopers
* Regular Trooper
plus Adjunct Advisors
This complicates slightly with the notion of branch-specific heraldry/color, along with distingishing "flag" officers & Sr. NCOs from NCOs & Enlisted, along with subdued field vs dress insignia. Easy, right?
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I was browsing eBay to order the OOP metal Teminator Lighting Claws to fix up the Malcadon, but, weak-willed that I am, I actually ended up ordering a handful of OOP metal Escher Gangers because they're so nice. Oops. I also ordered the Canoness to complete my Sisters force.
ETA - Rehabbed an Inquisitor in Mk.V "Heresy" armor with Power Fist & Digital weapon.
1/14 - Stripped, cleaned and reassembled old Missionary with chainsword.
1/31 - Updated list to reflect sale of 3 excess Infantry Squads
2/4 - Updated text to reflect final army plan.
5/20 - Update to reflect further reductions in excess weapons, duplicate Heavy Weapon Squad, unnecessary Special Weapon Squad.
Yesterday, I finally got around to attaching backpacks and jump packs to the handful of Sisters Seraphim & Superior who needed them, so my girls are finally "done", as in fully-playable:
Total 26 T3 Imperials completed year-to-date, so it's a good run.
Next up are my Classichammer Fantasy Dogs of War, starting with Mengil's Manflayers, before moving on to various pikemen and so forth:
to-do * assemble Familars [5] * assemble Leopold's Leopard Company [22+2] * assemble Ricco's Republican Guard [4] * assemble Dark Elf Crossbow Command Standard (conversion) * assemble 3rd Dark Ogre (conversion) * assemble Dark Captasus (conversion) ____
ETA - Well crap. I opened the Manflayer clamshell, and darned if the models aren't at least a half-head taller than the rest of the DoW and Empire stuff that I own. Plus, they're all splayed out, so storage becomes an issue. I guess I'll focus on the pikemen first, of which I have plenty enough to keep me busy for a while. ____
ETA - ... or, I could repair the Captain conversion and assemble the 5 Chaos Familiars that I never got around to. Yeah. Small work. Kinda wish I had gotten a LOT more Familiars back when GW sold bitz by the gram. I could have gotten so many Familars that way!
These are the Chaos Familiars I finally got around to cleaning and getting playable: The Mannequin, Armored Mite and Daemonette are duplicates that I already own, but can paint differently, but the Thing and Lune are new. This gets me to 15 total Familiars out of something like 2 dozen. No, I'm not going to be hunting them.
Having slept on the question of my Mengil Manhide's Manflayers, and the Diazettes and the Slaanesh Lord I've been holding, I decided to put them all on the selling block. For how little I'm playing, and how much I own, I just don't need to build them when they add so little to my gaming experience versus the effort required to get them playable. Especially when I see what some of them can sell for, but mostly because selling them instantly reduces my backlog and storage requirements!
OTOH, Leopold's Leopard Company are easy to build, give me a 2nd flavor of much-needed pike, and store nicely. Yes! Keep! Build! ____
1/16 - cleaned and built the first 8 pikemen. 14 to go!
Here are the first 8 Dogs of War pikemen from Leopold's Leopard Company:
It's a start!
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In other news, in digging through the closet, I can't find my WFB bitz box with the matching pikes for my Ricco's Republican Guard. Probably buried in dust with my pin vise. *sigh*
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I built Leopold, his command, and 5 more pikemen: This brings the unit to 16 models, so it's playable. I still have another 6 before the unit is done.
After that, I have to stop until I can find my bitz box.
In the mean time, I ordered a metal 40kSoB Canoness because I kinda need one to complete that sub-army. ____
1/19 - built last 6 pikemen bringing the unit to full strength of 22 total, rebased a couple witches for 40k use.
I also dug out my WFB 5E Empire Regiments. It turns out that I have a lot of them, and that I picked through the various bitz. I have at least 60 multi-pose plastic Troopers with 2 metal Handgunner upgrade kits for 16 Troops, led by 2 metal Sergeants with Hochland Long Rifles and 2 metal Sergeants with Repeater Handguns. Plus loads of Swords, Shields and 2-part Halberds.
I reshuffled the storage about, and I would be able to fit 28 infantry in the Empire case, so that's how many Handgunners I'll make.
I built the remaining 6 pikemen, so I finished the Leopold's Leopard Company unit:
This "completes" my Dogs of War army, so I'm "done" for the time being, with the last few models needing my pin vise for conversions.
Empire Handgunners are next, intending to have 3x 10 with a fancy gun on the Champion to finish off my Fantasy stuff.
After that, it'll be a reassessment of my Eldar forces and probably time to sell off a bunch more models to get down to what I actually want to keep as things to play. ____
ETA - The Escher I ordered arrived, so I'm getting them stripped and assembled.
I finished cleaning and assembling the new Escher models! They're just so nice.
40k-wise, I'm waiting on the Terminator Lighting Claws and Sisters Canoness to "complete" the Inquisition and Sisters stuff.
In going through the Emprire models, I set aside the first 18 plastic Handgunner bodies that I'll be assembling from the bases up. It looks like the typical metal Handgun is held cross-body, so there should be less of an issue with "tippy" models like I had with the hybrid Crossbowmen. Nevertheless, I still intend to glue weight into the bases to help minimize any tendency to fall over.
I should probably break out my Empire Armies book to see how they're all supposed to be organized. LOL. ____
First cut at an army looks like this:
Proposed Empire Army List v.2
Lords General on Horseback
Heroes Captain on Horseback (BSB) Warrior Priest on Horseback Wizard (lv. 2)
8 Empire Knights of the White Wolf [FC] 6 Empire Knights [FC]
Special 23 Greatswords [FC] +10 Halberdiers (d)
Great Cannon
Rare Helblaster Volley Gun Helblaster Volley Gun
Italics = Work in Progress (WiP)
Deployment Characters on horseback join the larger unit of 8 Knights; Wizard joins Greatswords
Painting
At some point, I will want to paint this, and it will need to contrast against my Dogs of War in Purple & White & Silver (+Yellow +Grey). With all of the Artillery and Handgunners, color-wise, it should be Nuln-ish in color, so there will be a lot of black on many units (basically everything gunpowder), so it needs a bright color: Red, Blue, or Green. As my Imperial Guard are already Green, I'm thinking to go with Red as the primary color, Black as contrast on blackpowder units, Off-White as contrast on everything else, alternate primary of Crimson, with Brown and Steel accent colors. ____
ETA - I found my WFB bitz box! It turns out I have another dozen-ish metal Handgunner bitz that I'll be building, likely at the expense of Swordsmen.
But more importantly, it has the pikes for my Republican Guard pikemen! Yes!
There's also most of a Keeper of Secrets that I should try to sell if it's not for count-as DoW Pegasus conversion. Wow. ____
2/4 - I made arrangements to trade off a small pile of Empire, so the list is somewhat smaller.
It turns out that I only have 11 unbroken pike bitz for my Republican Guard, where I need 15 to build up all of the models. Nevertheless, I went ahead and built the first 5, bringing in the unit strength up from 15 to 20:
I used the remaining half-dozen unbroken pikes to assemble 6 more of Ricco's pikement, brinigng the unit to 26 models total:
I like the look of the unit all together, even if there are 4 more pikes that need some sort of conversion / pinning / rebuild.
38 total Dogs of War built YtD!
With that, my Dogs of War really are "done" for the immediate future, pending a push to finish the conversions: * Dark Captasus * Dark Marksmen Standard * Republican Guard pikemen (4) * Dark Ogre
Empire up next. For real. Honestly.
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ETA - there was a trio of Dark Eldar Prisoner & Slave minis in the case, but I don't need so many! I have a SoB Prisoner and a converted Slave for Fantasy, so I put the other Slave on a round base for my 40k =Inquisition=. I'll probably sell the extra Prisoner models unless I can think of a good reason to keep them for playing.
31 total T3 Imperials built YtD.
All told, including rebasing and repairs, it's closer to 80 models YtD ____
1/25 - glued the legs on the Keeper of Secrets Giant and the Winged Nightmare Ogre.
... or I could just keep on building Dogs of War stuff. Like that 3rd Dark Ogre: The Ogre is based on the long OOP Winged Nightmare mount for Melkhior the Ancient, subsequently replaced by the larger and more impressive Winged Nightmare mount for the Blood Dragon version.
This is my 3rd such Nightmare conversion, bringing the unit up to the necessary minimum 3 models. Unlike the other two, he's not upright, but that's OK, because I only have 1 pose, so the postural variation helps make them individuals.
This is a pure SGT build, rather than a brass pin & GS effort, so the assembly is *much* faster (no drilling).
As for Melkhoir the Ancient, he's too big for me to use as a Wizard on mount, and he's not armored like a Captain, so I think he'll be sold off to someone who wants an OOP Vampire. ____
ETA - rebased a couple of the duplicate Familiars on diagonal bases to prependicular/parallel slots so they wouldn't match up identically when ranked.
Core 30 Ricco's Republican Guard 22 Leopold's Leopard Company 10 Vespero's Vendetta 8 Voland's Venators (~Empire Knights) 14 Braganza's Besiegers 13 Marksmen of Malice (DE Xbows)
Special 15 Lumpin Croop's Fighting Cocks (Chaos Familiars) 4 Golfag's Ogres (~old Nightmares)
Rare Giants of Albion (~Keepers of Secrets) Asarnil the Dragonlord (~Forest Dragon)
This is likely the "final" configuration for my Warhammer Fantasy Dogs of War. While the army has grown from the 2015 inventory, I don't intend to buy anything further for it, nor do I intend to sell anything. I'm just going to finish building and move on to painting, which is plenty enough work to be done!
Work in Progress
I have a couple larger models that I have started conversion, but are not yet complete: * newer Winged Nightmare = Ogre Captain Golfag * older Winged Nightmare = one of his Ogres
There is a 3rd, incomplete Keeper of Secrets model, which I don't really need, and probably should sell at some point; however, I still thing maybe I want it for a "dark" Captasus conversion.
Models to Buy
At some point, I ought to buy a metal HE Dragon Prince (for riding Asarnil), as I don't particularly like the WE Lord model that came with the Forest Dragon that I'm using.
And that's it folks. Done buying, except for maybe 1 model. Done building except for 2 (or 3) models.
I've been sifting through my WFB Dogs of War, after my Imperial stuff for 40k and my WFB Empire army.
Dogs of War In doing so, I found I was happiest with my Dogs of War army, because the amount I had was almost identical to the amount I owned, of which, the overwhelming majority being playable. My Dogs of War army has but one unplayable model (the 4th Nightmare), a handful more that need conversion work (the Keeper of Secrets and the Pikemen), and only couple "excess" models (a couple of Cannon). Everything that I have aligns with what I want to keep and play.
Imperial Guard OTOH, my 40k Imperials have at least a full Platoon "extra" that I won't ever play, above and beyond the stuff that exists to give a wealth of unnecessary options. This despite the fact that the playability aspect is even higher, due to having significantly more completed models and fewer models needing repair/conversion (only the Shadowsword really stands out). That extra Platoon nags at me, and selling it would make me feel quite a bit better, so I think that's what I need to do, after I shuffle the models about so more squads can be posed uniquely. ... so I'm selling it, reducing the "to be painted pile" by 30-odd models.
Sisters of Battle & Inquisition My Sisters are fully-built, although I have a Canoness en route. I'm looking forward to receiving her so that the entire Sisters army can be "done", just as the Inquisition portion is complete. The Lightning Claws are also en route, so I hope to have these fully assembled by next weekend.
Empire And then, there's my WFB Empire army, which has just a huge host of multi-pose infantry to build. Dozens of models, literally an army worth. That build task just keeps getting back-burnered in favor of something shinier, so I think it's a sign that I should shift focus to another army that I can make better progress on.
For the moment, I will focus on re-aligning what I have against what I want, and then unloading the rest, or buying the one-off models and bitz I "need" to make each army "complete". In going through the armies, the small stuff (SoB, Inquistion, Escher, Spyrers) are much easier to assess for completeness and keeping.
This evening, I went through my Imperial Guard army, and reorganized things to match the formations. As a result, I'll be selling the 30-odd Tallarn Imperial Guardsmen that strictly duplicate other models and units, only existing as excess models for the sake of having them. Yes, it means that my Emperor's Shield Infantry Platoon has a squad of Remnants and a squad of Cadians replacing the last couple all-Tallarn squads, and I'm more likely to field them than not.
And you know what?
I feel really good about that!
Yes, it would have been better had I never purchased them in the first place; however, seeing the smaller, more compact Imperial Guard army that remains, where every model has its place and purpose? That makes me happy in the same way that I'm really happy with the Dogs of War and Sisters of Battle armies that I have. The Imperial Guard collection is "done".
In addition, my Imperial Guard army cases are full, but I've moved the high-density inserts into the Empire case, so I now have the slots I need for storing the Empire infantry models that I intend to build.
After a quick and easy bath in Castrol Super Clean to strip the paint and primer off, this is the result:
31 Tallarn Guardsmen back to bare metal, ready for eBay!
In the back of my mind, I'm wondering whether I can consolidate what is currently 3 transport cases of T3 Imperials (IG, =I=, SoB & Nec) down to 2, freeing up a case for another game system or whatever.
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2/1 - Hm. To get down to there, I'd have to cut back another couple dozen minis. That's a bit more culling than I'm necessarily prepared to do, but it's not a bad idea based on what I actually play...
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2/2 - I ID'd another half-dozen Guard minis that I wouldn't miss, so they'll be stripped and sold. It feels strange to see empty spots in the case.
I picked up my Canoness at the local GW and built her same day. There are an impressive number of bitz, including a bolt pistol, chainsword, book, and scroll that I didn't use - I figured she should have the fanciest weaponry available on the sprue.
In addition, having decided to pull another 8 Guardsmen from the pile, I went and made a trio of 40mm Objective markers.
Yes, there's a little space left in the the storage boxes, but I feel like the army is sufficiently "done" that I'm happy to just let it be.
I went back to my Mordheim Vampire Assassin, which I had originally intended as a DoW Wizard. Having far too many "Wizard" models, I had very recently rebased her for use in in my 40k =Inquisition= forces as a retinue model. However, as I've reworked my armies, I decided she would be of far better use as the basis for a DoW Moneylender.
Rather than arming her with a cutlass, per the original design, I converted up a super-thin longsword:
I think the slim blade suits the model better, without having the professionally-trained & duelling connotation of a fencing rapier or such. She's just a very rich woman who can afford a really fine sword.
Thanks! She's a gorgeous sculpt that I'm not sure I can do justice when I get around to painting her.
With how far along my Dogs of War army is, I need to take a group photo of them all together. There are maybe a handful of models to finish building & conversion, and then it'll be all ready for painting.
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I ended up getting "count-as" Ogre Captain Golfag to a playable state, getting him standing on his 40mm base:
He is the largest and bulkiest of my Ogre models, as befits an Ogre Captain, but I need to make a head and clean up the back before he can be "done". ____
ETA - As I was putting him in the case, I decided my Forest Dragon could use some cleanup, so I started rehabbing it so it'd be fewer, more solid pieces. I permanently attached the neck and head, so he'll still sit in the case, but his wings and arms will remain separate. Though I gotta say, GW's generic plastic dragon wings are not satisfying to see. Maybe I'll steal some other wings for him. Or just have be more of an Asian dragon. Hm.
I finished gap-filling the seams with SGT, so my Dragon is "done":
Most of the pinning work was done before, but the head and neck had never been attached to the body. Now it's one big, sturdy piece, which will be better on the tabletop. The arms and wings plug in for play, remove for storage & transport.
In going through the other wings in my bitz box, there really aren't any good alternatives that don't require major customization (which would be just as well to remove them entirely. So my choices are to keep using the plastic wings, or completely remove the shoulders and sculpt new with GS.
As I can always carve away, but it's hard to restore that kind of surgery, I think I leave it to the plastic wings for the moment.
I finally got around to inventorying my multipose Empire Soldiers bitz to see what I can make, counting all of the legs and torsos and such. I had enough to build a whopping 83 additional State Troops, which I plan as follows:
+ 36 Handgunners,
+ 24 Halberdiers,
+ 12 Swordsmen, and
+ 11 Free Company.
I then started sorting the 5E Handgunner and Command bitz using one of my Plano boxes to help organize individual bits by type (e.g. Handgunner arms). I then grouped the various bitz for separate units (e.g. 1st Handgunner unit) so that I can build visually coherent units that will be easier for me to identify on the tabletop. In the case of the 4 identically-equipped Handgunner units, I've got a split combination of Torsos & Legs & Handguns: AAA, ABB, BAC, BBD, effectively turning them into 4 monopose models. I then built the 9 AA and 9 BB versions needed for the first couple units, along with reference BA and CC (Halberdier) models :
Once I get the Handgunners knocked out, things should be somewhat easier, as the weapon selection (Halberd, Sword & Shield, or 2 Weapons) will dominate the model design.
Are these the ones which came with the metal rifles and crossbows? I've got 3 sets of those arms and command group and I've no idea where they came from.
Should look good, I preferred the legs and torsos of these guys compared to there current incarnation. The puffs and frills make these much more characterful.
Look forward to see the wood elf dragon get some colour.
They are! Hybrid metal weapons and bits for a multipose plastic mini.
I'll have a picture up soon enough
Automatically Appended Next Post: With that, I got the arms and bitz on the first couple Handgunners:
For the effort involved in cleaning and prepping the various joints, I really wish I had just bought (or ordered!) when my LHS still had metal Empire available on the pegs. All of the plastic needs to be scored to give the SGT something to grip, along with any metal that got filed smooth. Plus alignment, etc.
Truth be told, they do look nice, and would be great for a skirmish game. Like Mordheim, which is when I bought my first Empire Crossbowmen box, giving me an entire Warband with choices for Halberds, Swords, Shields and Crossbows, plus Command bitz! The OOTB customization and posing options are awesome for that kind of game, but total overkill for RnF models to be fielded in en masse. Which is why GW almost immediately switched Empire back to monopose plastics.
So they're something of a historical artifact of their time, when GW was transitioning from metal to plastic - a noble experiment.
I build two reference models of the "type B" Handgunner, along with a 3rd "type C" Handgunner: That's a total of 5 RnF Handgunners for 3 of the 4 planned units.
I didn't get much done today, just clipping some Empire bitz from sprue and consolidating a bag of bitz; however, this reduced things down to: * Plano organizer of bitz and reference models, organized by unit; * 2 *identical* "Handgunner" boxes of 18 Empire Soldiers on sprue; * 1 "Crossbowmen" box of all other Empire stuff on sprue.
When I had started my Empire project, I had 2 more bags and another box of stuff on sprues, and the "organization" was more haphazard.
Now, I have clarity on how to finish the Empire army. My WiP stuff is more organized, and I only need dig into the Plano organizer for what I'm actively working on. ____
2/11 - I received a metal Empire Warrior Priest with Great Hammer (Luthor Huss), stripped and cleaned it tonight. I also got 10 of 14 arms on Handgunners, so I could finish the 1st Handgunner unit in the next day or so
I finished the first 2 unit of Empire Handgunners tonight:
That gets half of my Handgunners completed, and the other 2 units are already started, so the army is getting there. Once the Handgunners are completed, I'll move on to Halberdiers, Swordsmen and Free Company, before re-arming regular Knights with lances to KotWW with hammers. ____
2/13 - I clipped more Soldier bitz, so I can build the next batches of Handgunners.
So... it's been a month, and I've been in something of a funk due to various Life things happening to my extended family.
I've been less able to enjoy the collecting side of the wargaming hobby, as a lot of it makes me just want to further decrease the parts of my collection that hardly, if ever, get played.
I ended up pulling another 20-odd Guardsmen from the pile to put up for sale, basically shrinking down to the "minimum" Formations with "minimum" extras. It's good!
I guess it's time to get serious about shrinking the Eldar pile, too. ____
Surprisingly, the amount of obvious excess Eldar is less than I had expected, as a fair lot of it was just cluttered and unorganized. Getting it all together and sorted made it more sensible, and first pass showed a couple dozen I could easily do without. OTOH, I don't need 9,000-odd points of Eldar, so I'll keep cutting back and see where it ends up.
To all of you who were following me, wow, it's been a long time since I've had anything to say here, or really any social media.
Since my last post, I indeed sold off a pile of excess Eldar & Guardsmen and generally liquidated the unbuilt portion of the "closet of shame".
Volks' Five Star Stories models are available in the US, in plastic! I don't have to order from Japan, deal with ForEx and/or international shipping. As a result, I finally bought the SSI Kulvulkan "Bang Doll" that I've had on my wishlist for literally decades:
It's so beautiful!
Anyhow, I was doing my homework on buildup, and apparently, yes, it's a bit of a bear to assemble. I take this to mean "old school" plastic model building skills are required, like what I used to do decades ago before I got into Warhammer, before I got into Gundam, back when I was building 1/35 scale armor. No worries, I didn't expect it to "fall together" like a new Gundam kit. The OOTB color separation looks good, and the detail is fantastic.
Then, on Black Friday, I swung by Brookhurst Hobbies to check on their Gundam sale for my boys, and I ended up doubling down on a V.Siren "Neptune":
I've started building the Neptune, as "warmup" to get a feel for how Volks' IMS models build up. As it turns out, they're like building Kingdom Death plastics, but with bigger assemblies. This surprised me, but then, it didn't. These are passion art kits that were originally hand-sculpted as resin before being turned into plastic kits, trying to reproduce resin-style components and resin-style assembly. This results in a certain amount of insanity. For example, the Neptune hips have a 2-part clamshell core. To which, you add 2 more 2-part clamshells, and then a 3rd clamshell. All of which could have been done with 2 larger pieces guaranteeing perfect alignment and positioning, rather than gluing plastic bits together to simulate the process where you'd pin resin pieces. It would have been cheaper to produce, especially as there aren't any fore-aft undercuts that would have been visible under the armored skirting. LOL Still, it's an experience to build, and I'm enjoying it.
Anyhow, that's what I'm up to.
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EDIT: At some point, I finished the Baneblade that I had intended to convert into a Shadowsword, so it's just a Baneblade with non-standard "pattern" so that it's reasonably playable as such.
Harlequins 1 Great Harlequin
2 Solitaires
1 Shadowseer
3 Death Jesters
22 Harlequins
Dark Kin 1 Archon
10 Warriors
Fewer Aspects, no real changes to Ghost Warriors, Harlequins or Dark Eldar. At this point, it's never going to get any larger, so I'm putting a pin in things and calling them done.
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Wissenlander Empire
My Empire forces will be themed around Wissenland troops & Nuln gunpowder.
The army skews toward gunpowder & Artillery, but the Wissenland theme helps clarify how to finish remaining WiP:
* build remaining multipose infantry as 4 Halberds and 12 Free Company
* convert 8 Knights to have 2 swords
I have a fair amount of BFG, and found a pile of Imperial & Chaos Cruiser bitz, so I built 2 more Orbital Defense stations.
They're pretty straightforward combinations of the Imperial Launch Bays, Imperial Lances, and Chaos Batteries with Imperial Conns. With the additional stations, I now have 5, more than enough to give any attacker pause.