Welcome all to the 127th round of the Dakka Painting challenge. For the unfamiliar, this is a friendly painting competition open to members of all skill levels and experience, whether your entry is your first or you thousand-and-first time painting miniatures. Each month, finished entries are collected into a thread where the community can vote on their favorite pieces, and those votes go towards an annual overall League that runs for 12 rounds.

This month the topic is: Chaff - Little guys swarming the battle field. Peasant levies, grots, gaunts, conscripts. Disposable things to clutter up the battlefield and get in the enemy’s way. Or fighter jets deploying countermeasures. Little bits or radar reflective foil marching across the battlefield. Tyranid gaunts being thrown from the back of aircraft to intercept missiles. Due to the nature if this topic, we will lift the normal 5 model limit.

- You may enter up to 5 MODELS AS MANY MODELS AS YOU WANT as a SINGLE ENTRY, and are permitted one entry per member per month. If you enter multiple models, they should ideally be related in some way, such as part of the same squad, unit or scene if you are doing a diorama
- You may enter at any time during the month, up to the last minute. We do encourage people to enter early, as to be part of the community, but if you can’t start until the 11th hour, that’s OK.
- You MUST post a 'proof' picture of your entry in the thread of the state it was in before you started working on it; this must be either unassembled, unpainted, primed or coated a single colour. Entries that do not submit a valid Proof Picture will not be eligible for voting.
- After this, you may post WIP pictures in this thread and your own if you wish, and on completing the entry, you may post up to 6 final pictures IN THIS THREAD that will then be used for voting. Please note that pictures in a montage or collage picture will be considered individual images for this purpose, so while these types of presentation are certainly acceptable, please keep the image limit in mind when compiling them. For example, a collage of 5 images and one separate image would count as your 6 picture allowance.


So What Do I Win?
- Points... and points mean... bragging rights for the next month! Following the vote, points will be awarded to every entrant. This year, the Points you receive will be equal to the Percentage of Votes your entry receives in the final Voting thread; if you get 10%, you get 10 points, if you get 6% you get 6 points, so on and so forth.

These points will be used to form a league table, which will be updated month on month as the results come in.

How Long Do I Have?
This challenge begins 1st of September and will end at midnight EST on September 30th. After this, I shall compile the finished entries into a new thread, and voting will run for 5 days

Once ee walked among da uvver grots, and der was none oo knew ee was diffrent. But den, scavengin after da Waaagh ad got in a scrap wif da oomies, ee found Da Book, wot told im ow to be a proper Grot Marine. Ee is Rowboat Ultraman, and ee and is bruvvers ave returned in da galaxy's Hour of Need.

For September’s painting competition I’m going to be working on some Clanrats. They really are the definition of chaff, so I figured they fit the theme perfectly. I thought about doing skeletons, but I’m going to save those for October since they’ll tie in better with a Halloween vibe.

Looking forward to seeing everyone else’s entries!

I aim to paint these craven, incomp... I mean these valiant and greatly appreciated asset redistribution specialists.

Let’s see how much of this box I can burn through in a month. Starting with the nerogaunts in the back. Their only job is to take up space in a vaguely constructive manor. Not that the rest of the guants are much better, but they at least have guns and claws and such.

 Geifer wrote:
I aim to paint these craven, incomp... I mean these valiant and greatly appreciated asset redistribution specialists.

I am really excited to see what you do with the Weequay! They are among the very few SWS minis I don't own. Speaking of which...

From the perspective of the Empire, all Force Users are chaff to be used and discarded.

I will have to think about this one. Maybe some more 1/72 scale crewmen.

Cheers,

CB

 inmygravenimage wrote:
I am really excited to see what you do with the Weequay!

Hopefully something colorful. Feels like I mostly painted stuff brown or black this year. Which incidentally stopped me from entering something from my box of Inquisitors once or twice already...

 Daia T'Nara wrote:
Once ee walked among da uvver grots, and der was none oo knew ee was diffrent. But den, scavengin after da Waaagh ad got in a scrap wif da oomies, ee found Da Book, wot told im ow to be a proper Grot Marine. Ee is Rowboat Ultraman, and ee and is bruvvers ave returned in da galaxy's Hour of Need.

Loving the grot with the centurion crest, might have to steal that!

Hmmm. If they’re not leaders or heavies then gangers and juves are chaff right?



Or maybe in the eyes of the Imperium all Necromundans are chaff. That’ll have to do anyway. We’ll see how many I get done.

I've got a load of goblins in need of some paint. Unlikely to finish them all but might as well start off optimistically

Proof! Imperial Guardsmen are the closest thing the Imperium gets to chaff, I guess.

Here is my proof.

The fellow on the left is done, but I'm going to paint up the grot as chaff, and if I'm really feeling ambitious the boss who commands where he goes to probably die:

My original plan was to enter as many of the new Wargames Atlantic Citizens as I get done, but as they are still pre-order, I may not have enough time. For the time being, I'll be working on these Martian Grunts:

Going to enter Zarbag's gitz and a couple extra squigs
Not sure how many I will get through....

Let's see if I can get some chaff done this month. Fingers crossed!

Okay I'm officially in with a mob of Kruleboyz Hobgrot Slittaz:

These guys are the definition of chaff, just expendable mooks whose only real role on the battlefield seems to be to get in the way of enemy units and be a speed bump for them. And honestly they're pretty terrible at that, hence why nobody I've heard of uses them outside of very casual games.

 KidCthulhu wrote:
Let's see if I can get some chaff done this month. Fingers crossed!

It's cool seeing guys from the old Lion Heart board game

Hordes of models you say? Oh well. There's been a change of plans!



I'm going to try to get the Battle of Hoth painted up. That's a perfectly sane thing to do in 3 weeks.

 KidCthulhu wrote:
Let's see if I can get some chaff done this month. Fingers crossed!

I used those guys to fill out my cousins empire army 25 years ago. If I remember correctly there were a bunch of farmers that we used as flagellants as well. To be honest I never knew which game they came from or how we ended up with them.


I'm going to try to paint some goblins that I printed off of thingiverse courtesy of MattKing. I say try as I will be making a trip back to the states in a couple days and I still need to print bases. If I can print bases and prime before I leave I will have about a week when I get back for paint. That might be doable.

 Peterhausenn wrote:
I used those guys to fill out my cousins empire army 25 years ago. If I remember correctly there were a bunch of farmers that we used as flagellants as well. To be honest I never knew which game they came from or how we ended up with them.

They do indeed have peasants!



I bought the game at a flea market for $10 last month and 89 out of 92 models were in pristine condition.

Slowly making progress:

Can I join with these scratch built (Chaff - slayers)?

 Mothsniper wrote:
Can I join with these scratch built (Chaff - slayers)?

Of course. What a krazy build!

 Nevelon wrote:

 Mothsniper wrote:
Can I join with these scratch built (Chaff - slayers)?

Of course. What a krazy build!

Awesome!
I knew these krazy containers will come on handy one day. Unless that plastic is too smooth for paint to stick.
Have to justify saving bins of rubish.
https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/30/804229.page

That's a whole lot of hoth

So much drybrushing that the brush snapped.

Twice.

Okay I might have to get that game, those minis look dope!

Making progress...

Last 2 neurogaunts just got their base coat. Rest are waiting to be based.

Some wip pics
Primed everything and painted up a test mini for a color scheme.
Made some base's with clay and got those out the way first.

Great job! I love those bases. I too make custom sculpted bases. I must have made well over 200 by now.

Edit: stupid new page

Great job! I love those bases. I too make custom sculpted bases. I must have made well over 200 by now.

Thanks, they are quite fun to make while chilling out watching a film

So I have interpreted it as the hordes of imperial soldiery and rebel troops of the Battle of Hoth - plus vehicles and installations.





79 minis is a perfectly reasonable number to enter, right?

Well done, Graven! Suddenly my horde isn't so horde-y

And I thought I was doing well getting 11 little guys done in only half the month!

Still need flock, but almost there.

Started on some ripper swarms to help them clog up the battlefield.

—

Month is half over, plan accordingly.

19 clanrats
-1 because I painted 1 earlier this year

KidCthulhu wrote:Well done, Graven! Suddenly my horde isn't so horde-y

Thanks KC I did wonder if I'd bitten off more than I could chew...

Progress

Making much more progress now. Still have to make a base for the last three I intend on entering:



I still need to add woodgrain to the hafts and trim the bases in black... and three primed guys in the back that aren't even started.

My entry is coming along, still plenty to do though:

Got the last three primed and glued onto a wide base. I want to get those three to the same stage as the previous 12 before moving on to what's next.

Daia T'Nara: Rowboat Ultraman and da Grot Primarchs:



In da Imperramum's gratest Hour of Need, dey ave returned.



Da finder of Da Book wot tells ow to be a proper Grot Marine, Rowboat Ultraman, wif Jiggly Kan (ee's jiggly on account of all da bacon butties, do not mock im, ee is grate man) an Fuelkan (ee likes burnin' stuff):



Leakin Rust (wif da Wolf Pelt ov Raggirock, it's not a rat stop saying it's a rat), Sam Wingiest (da wingiest primarch, coz ee's got wings), an Curvy Thorax (wearin da Helmet of Artie B Owen):



Furious Anus (if you ad to scratch wif a metal claw, you'd be angry too), Regal Don (master of Seege Warfare, which is where you stay in da camp coz it's comfy) and Unforgiven Lionel (ee knows what ee did):



And for da First Time Evvar, da mystery Tenth Primarch, Miss Ing (ee's da one wot makes da skinny space marines wif da chest bumps and pretty hair, dunno why oomies fink dis is such a big mystery, but oomies are pretty fick):



Dey are da Grot Marines, and dey fear no nose!

(Noses isn't dat scary really, cept da Warphead when ee sneezes, we do fear dat. But uvverwise, no.)

Hee hee hee! Hilarious write up, Daia T’Nara. What a fun project!

Hey all, a little update

Calling these guys done and about to start some goblins

Hello painting challenge team,

I took the proof photo a few weeks ago with best of intentions and haven't touched a brush since then.

I've got a week off work though, so hopefully that's enough time to churn out some grunts. I have a bunch of troopers for my Ashlander Exodites to paint up.



Let's gooooooo

Keep up the good work everyone!
—


I hate rippers. So small and fiddly. Not helped by me cramming 5 on a base for these guys. Makes it hard to get a brush where it needs to be.

 Nevelon wrote:
Keep up the good work everyone!

I'll take some liberties with this and keep up my barely adequate work, if you don't mind. I do so enjoy prioritizing boring real life stuff over painting...

Currently it looks like I'll be cutting it close again this month.

 Geifer wrote:

 Nevelon wrote:
Keep up the good work everyone!

I'll take some liberties with this and keep up my barely adequate work, if you don't mind. I do so enjoy prioritizing boring real life stuff over painting...

Currently it looks like I'll be cutting it close again this month.

I almost put a qualifier on the “good work” bit but decided to play it straight. People can keep up whatever they can, at whatever pace.

And as always, if anyone needs an extension, just ask.

Optimistic me wants to finish properly so as not to slip into bad habits, but this month there's a real risk that I may have to take you up on that extension.

But all in good time. We're not there yet. Positivity. It's all about positivity.

I finished off the Martians:







Not my best paintjobs by any means, what with the impossible-to-clean restic mold lines, but they are finished, and they look alright at tabletop distances. Working on them, I remembered why I don't enjoy batch painting units very much. I still have a week left, though, so I pulled out some civilian survivors that may or may not get added to my entry:

Whilst I only have one of them to enter, the Zaku is the original enemy mook-mecha of the Gundam franchise. Its name was inspired by the Japanese word zako, meaning small-fry.

Proof

 JoshInJapan wrote:
I finished off the Martians:

Spoiler:

Not my best paintjobs by any means, what with the impossible-to-clean restic mold lines, but they are finished, and they look alright at tabletop distances. Working on them, I remembered why I don't enjoy batch painting units very much. I still have a week left, though, so I pulled out some civilian survivors that may or may not get added to my entry:

Ack ack ack!

Ack ACCK ack!

(my first thoughts as well)

--

Finished up some rippers, waiting to be based:

Started 4 spinefist gaunts. See how many I can cycles across the bench before we run out of month.

--

We have one week to go. As a reminder, no vote for next month as we have our annual Halloween Special. Get the ghosts and goblins prepped and ready.

Better late than never, I suppose! Chaff is the perfect theme for the humble, human soldiers in Trench Crusade. May God guide my little trench sweeper!

Work continues on the Hobgrots:

Glad I decided to do an all-over wash, it really helped to tone down the bright yellow-green skin, and it made them look more grimy too.

Clanrats done

 Misclicking ork wrote:

Clanrats done

Don’t forget you can have up to 6 pictures. While a mess of rats is an appropriate and thematic way to display them, maybe break them up into some smaller groups and get some better pictures? Like a few lines of 5.

 Nevelon wrote:

 Misclicking ork wrote:

Clanrats done

Don’t forget you can have up to 6 pictures. While a mess of rats is an appropriate and thematic way to display them, maybe break them up into some smaller groups and get some better pictures? Like a few lines of 5.

I was tired and just wanted to get the photo in. But now that I'm not tired, here's some better pictures

Nice! Can see them a lot better now.

Okay, I think I'm as done as I'm gonna get...

Kid Cthulhu-La Palaisian Met-At-Arms









Not my most impressive paintjobs, but they really elevate these simple game pieces into something I can actually use in Big Fantasy Epic.

 Misclicking ork wrote:

 Nevelon wrote:

 Misclicking ork wrote:

Clanrats done

Don’t forget you can have up to 6 pictures. While a mess of rats is an appropriate and thematic way to display them, maybe break them up into some smaller groups and get some better pictures? Like a few lines of 5.

I was tired and just wanted to get the photo in. But now that I'm not tired, here's some better pictures

Thanks for adding more photos. We could probably judge them better if they were photographed from a lower angle so we could see more of the models, though.

Welp. I did not get as much time to spend on these as I would have liked and we are off camping tomorrow, so I am calling them done!

I may go back and recolour the green tubes to be dark grey or leather, I think they are a bit gaudy atm.

I am also missing one dude after tzurk jr #2 decided to sneak down one night after bedtime and give him some impromptu improvements lol

Anyway I love this contest and I'm glad I've joined up, I got 10 minis painted this month and without it I think I would probably have had 0. Cheers everyone! I have not really had a chance to look at the other work in here yet - I'll probably save my feedback for the vote thread - we get back on the 2nd so timing lines up well.

 tzurk wrote:
I may go back and recolour the green tubes to be dark grey or leather, I think they are a bit gaudy atm.

I like them. They add a little color and match a few other small bits scattered across the models. I think they're small enough compared to the major areas of the models to add to the look rather than detract from it.

 tzurk wrote:

I am also missing one dude after tzurk jr #2 decided to sneak down one night after bedtime and give him some impromptu improvements lol

We do not require people to have a Dakka account to enter. If your kids want to participate they are more then welcome! Just be sure you specify which models are theirs, and what name they would like to enter under. Although “Jr”, numbered as needed, is the default.

It doesn’t happen often, but there is precedent. Always glad to help pass the torch to the next generation.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Geifer wrote:

 tzurk wrote:
I may go back and recolour the green tubes to be dark grey or leather, I think they are a bit gaudy atm.

I like them. They add a little color and match a few other small bits scattered across the models. I think they're small enough compared to the major areas of the models to add to the look rather than detract from it.

I second this.

Real camo is boring. That’s it’s job. Realistic looking uniforms end up just drab. My running joke is that I paint camo like Hollywood makes movies based on real-life events, Sure, you can tell where it’s coming from, but with more car crashes and explosions. So I have polished golds, bright red wires and orange tubes, all on top of the arctic or woodlands tiger stripe.

We paint to have either display or game pieces. You want the eye to catch on features. From a more practical point, well painted camo guys hiding in cover will be forgotten when the time comes to take actions/shoot/etc. By both your opponent AND you. Which while hilarious, will cost you games sometimes.

Well, with a very limited pile of items to paint, did some more HO scale crew.





Cheers,

CB

Back from the states, models have been based and primed, lets see how many I can finish in the next couple days.

I'm gonna have to drop out this month. Some things came up and I wasn't able to get the time necessary to get the amount of work I need to get done on the models.

OMG I just spent so. much. time painting today. I think I'm on track to get my guardsmen in on time.

I made good use of the weekend, which is also likely the last painting I would have gotten in this month. Not the best I could have done, but as much as I could do this month. Still, I'm reasonably happy with how the pie rats turned out.

Weequay Pirates:

Not one of my entry photos, but I wanted to share because my entry is in it:

Catastrophic base failure occurred when I removed one of my guardsmen from the painting handle. Apparently the previous owner used plaster of Paris to attach the mini to the base? Anyway, I think I was able to salvage it.

Test piece finished, only 9 more to go.

Necromunda Orlocks in full technicolour

I'm officially asking for the extension, Nev. I'm gonna need it to finish my models' bases. I might get the texture paint on them tonight but they'll need tomorrow for any of the water stuff to be applied, and that'll need some time to cure as well.

Finished.

I wish I could have painted a few more of these, but I knew that I was going to have no time for painting this month. I tried to get a photo of every angle this time. There wasn't any particular framing that spoke to me, so it's just a simple rotation.

Last minute proof!

I have actually started these grots today but will be rushing them through - I anticipate LOTS of washes!

Hopefully, I make it on time!

 ZergSmasher wrote:
I'm officially asking for the extension, Nev. I'm gonna need it to finish my models' bases. I might get the texture paint on them tonight but they'll need tomorrow for any of the water stuff to be applied, and that'll need some time to cure as well.

Granted. We’ll push this back a day and wrap it up tomorrow night (Oct 1st) or more accurately, Thursday the 2nd while I’m having my morning coffee.

I was debating asking myself. I’ve got 5 more spinefist gaunts who just need touch ups and to be based. But I’m not even sure I’m going to include them in my entry, or just keep it to neurogaunts and rippers

Done.
Glad to be part of the Challenge!

 Nevelon wrote:

 ZergSmasher wrote:
I'm officially asking for the extension, Nev. I'm gonna need it to finish my models' bases. I might get the texture paint on them tonight but they'll need tomorrow for any of the water stuff to be applied, and that'll need some time to cure as well.

Granted. We’ll push this back a day and wrap it up tomorrow night (Oct 1st) or more accurately, Thursday the 2nd while I’m having my morning coffee.

I was debating asking myself. I’ve got 5 more spinefist gaunts who just need touch ups and to be based. But I’m not even sure I’m going to include them in my entry, or just keep it to neurogaunts and rippers

Phew glad their was an extension, Wife has invited a load of family around for the coming weekend so its just been full throttle trying to get the house ready.

Will put up my proof here and the finished pics tomorrow, almost all finished now just got to do the skin.

I got as far as taking my original proof models into work to strip the paint (good range of solvents there) but never got around to it, so I started painting a few other gobbos instead. Nearly forgot to take a new proof picture, hopefully I caught these in an unpainted enough state for the challenge


the finished models




edit: Not sure why they look blurry in this thread, seem fine in the gallery

Sometimes I think the galleries auto-size feature messes with the pics. Note for everyone, especially in the vote thread: Click through the links will generally get you better views of the minis.

--


Took advantage of the day to rush the last lone gaunt across the bench to join the 5 waiting to be based. So instead of baseing and takeing pics of those 5 today, I’ll flock and snap these 6 tomorrow. Them and the 11 neurogaunts, 3 ripper swarms, and 4 other spinefists. 2 dozen models in a month, for 155 points worth of chaff. The joy of Nids. Those battlefields won’t carpet themselves with gribbles.

And done!

Imperial Army / Imperial Guard / Astra Militarum

Been done for a bit, but putting pics off as usual.

Proof on some battletech savannah master hovercraft, speedy little 5 ton terror sleds :


And their hotrod 1st Kestrel Grenadiers final paint scheme:

Real life struck hard this month, so I'm just glad to have got this done.

MS-06 Zaku II "chocosapu" candy toy.



Full images in the spoiler.

The paint on his base was still wet as I was taking the photos I think but I got my little guy done (it would have been pretty sad if I couldn't even finish one weedy little grot in a month after all).

I lived in Hawaii for a while and used to go body surfing. I had a pair of blue and yellow Churchill fins, so I've named him Churchill.

Ork Kommandos Distraction Grot:

Hi, all.

Got my grots done - not a lot of subtlety with these guys but the group fits the theme!

The idea for these guys is that they are scavenging whatever wargear that they can find on the dead bodies on the battlefield. The little mech is made of bits of sprue and a bit of bubble-tea straw, with bits of chaos and regular marines added.

Seems I'm not the only person running late this month!

Good luck everyone!

Thanks for the extra day, Just stuck the squig's to the base's and about to add pics shortly....

Edit: Finished pics, only managed to get two goblins finished

Goodluck all

Goblins galore...

Keep em coming in guys. We’ve got the day extension here for another 24 hours, but it’s time to get your spook on!

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/817558.page

I'm sensing a pattern this month. I guess I'm not the only one that was swamped this September. I suppose it is the start of the school year.

Dakka is laggy and almost unusable at the moment. Pushing this back another day, so hopefully things clear up and we can upload/post.

Nice to see so many Goblins this month

Tried to post earlier but the Website was down.

These guys screamed Chaff at me when I was looking for something to paint for this entry, I had an image in my mind of a ogre of similar just wading through Goblins, them flying off in all directions.

Scarcrag Snivellers Goblin Bloodbowl team

Looks like Dakka is back behaving. Still have the double extension. Will close it Friday morning.

--



3 levels of chaff. Rippers, and two levels of gaunts. The Neurogaunts are especially chaff-like, as all they do is take up space. They were fun to paint though. No eyes make things a lot easier. Throughout my army, I paint the “danger bits” on the nids red. trampling hooves, claws, talons, guns. But for these guys, the danger they bring is acting as a synapse booster. If they are in range of the network, anything in range of them is also connected to the synapse. So their little brain bug parasite got the treatment.

Spinefist and rippers I’ve painted before, but always need more little guys to fill the table.