Well, we keep upgrading the thing to a scythe... so I may add my own little scythe blade to the top anyway rather than just a cap for the staff.
Yggs, I'll get you your destroyer pic in a mo.
And here is the moment we've all been waiting for... the completed (for now anyway) Necron army! About 1080 pts by my count (with options). Hope you like it. It is zoomable but the detail on a per-figure basis is not great. As it stands: 1 Necron Lord, 3 destroyers and 36 warriors. Next round of painting will see the addition of the last 4 warriors, 3 wraiths and a destroyer.
Link seems broken, but it still grants access to the pic in the gallery (yeah, I didn't go to bed after all... but now it's 4am, and definitely have to go )
Sorry, I was fiddling with the size. Cant remember what the abbreviation is for a "large" pic... can only remember sm & md. I was just about to comment that your 2 AM bed time was a fond memory...
Thanks guys. Yes narceron... he knows. But we've got a pretty good Necron player at our local FLGS who can actually play them fairly competitively... and I'm fairly comfortable in sources close to my situation who tell me there will be a new 'cron dex next year. Besides... they are pretty neat and should do well enough again his usual competition.
Honestly, those necrons look well boring. Too much gold. I would have done them as ceramic necrons. Heh, but who am I to judge- these arnt' my necrons.
@Bossasarus: Well, that's the beauty of it... you can paint your Necrons however you'd like. Would love to see ceramics done nicely. But these match my son's "vision" of how he wanted them to look... so as long as he's satisfied, so am I. Frankly I think they look great on the battlefield though.
For Yggs, here's a closer shot of one of the destroyers showing the mottling and verdigris progression on the abdomen.
I think it is hard to paint Necrons in a non-boring way since there are only really a few places you can apply colors. the models look good though!
That is really why I like how your models are painted, Git, To me they seem a lot less boring then normal necrons. I like the color and how it is shaded. Great work.
Only thing I would do differently (if i was also better at painting ) would be to change their green weapons, I know they come with them like that, but I think another color would look very good with that goldish color. I am thinking of red, but blue would be nice. It would also make them seem very different than most necron armies!
Sageheart wrote:I think it is hard to paint Necrons in a non-boring way since there are only really a few places you can apply colors. the models look good though!
That is really why I like how your models are painted, Git, To me they seem a lot less boring then normal necrons. I like the color and how it is shaded. Great work.
Only thing I would do differently (if i was also better at painting ) would be to change their green weapons, I know they come with them like that, but I think another color would look very good with that goldish color. I am thinking of red, but blue would be nice. It would also make them seem very different than most necron armies!
As to the rod color... when we first started I did offer to get him other colors... but he was steadfast on getting the green.
To be clear, the Necron painting is my doing, though he did help with this last batch. The painting of these figures was part of his Christmas present... and since I'm using an airbrush for most of it that's something he hasn't learned how to do you. The doom eagles earlier in this thread are much better examples of his painting, though even in those I usually flit in over the top at the end to add fine detail and clean them up. For all that he's a good painter though, and he's done all his own assembly for quite a while now.
There is a fair amount of variation of units within the Necron army, but not a lot of variation witin each unit (i.e. you can't customize them). I would hold out until this summer when a new dex is expected.
Great job, after been away from Dakka for a fortnight I can honestly say that your updates don't disappoint one bit on my return. The colour scheme looks very natural which I personally think is very important for an army such as Necrons. As others have said there is little to allow you to distinguish one necron force from another but you have achieved it very well with the choice and application of your palate.
Taken me a while but I have managed to get through this entire thing in one go!
So impresed with everything that is going on here. Really inspiring. I can't wait for the wife to put away the christmas tree again so I can reclaim the space marine corner of the living room.
Some of the best looking necrons I've seen too. Adds a whole new level of character to an army many people seem to find boring or at least 2 dimensional.
This is really inspiring. I got into 40K about 4 yrs ago. But life got crazy and in 4 yrs I have managed to paint one model. But this past week my 3 yr old son started to get interested in my SM's. He calls then soldiers and just wants to play with them like army men but i put five together for him and let him paint them. They are all different colors of the rainbow and show a lot of primer. But its awesome to sit and watch him paint. I hope this is the beginning of an obsession for him, like it is for me.
Hey guys, thanks so much for all your kind comments. I'm really proud of my eldest... he's come a long way since he started in 40k a couple of years ago. He still has a lot to learn and has a tendency to rush things a bit when he's excited about a new character or unit (which makes for sloppy work), BUT he tackles figures on his own initiative and remembers and practices many of the things I've showed him about modeling and painting... so I'm pretty happy about his effort. When he can relax and focus, he's actually quite a good painter.
I do get great pleasure in putting the little finishing touches on his minis... makes them stand out and gives him a bit of a reward for taking his time and painting them well to begin with.
Speaking of how they look... my folks are visiting this weekend and my dad (as usual) brings me a box or two of stuff from the recesses of his house that he just cant get rid of... so he gives them to me because that "feels" less like he's throwing out old memories or family history (you young-uns may run into this eventually as you get older). Well, he brought over some very old, toy artillery cannons... all brass. These haven't been polished in well over 40 years, and Thing 1 plopped one down next to his Necrons. Minus the verdigris (since the cannons have not been exposed to water), the color and feel of the tarnished brass toy cannons is pretty much spot on for the Necrons. Thought you might enjoy the comparison.
Yggs: As to the rods... if you search "40k, necron" on e-bay you will find purveyors of other colors of rods. They aren't GW rods but they claim they fit and I've seen photos of them in actual Necrons though and it appears they fit nicely enough.
As to my method... I'm pretty sure I've described it a couple of times, once in detail. But of course I can't find it now so I must have been delusional.
Steps as follows: AB = airbrush for simplicity
1. Fully AB Vallejo golden brown.
2. Gentle AB Vallejo Rust = Tin bitz for overall metallic sheen.
3. From top, lightly AB Vallejo Bright Brass or gold as you prefer for highlight.
4 Healthy sepia wash.
5. Lightly dry brush upper surfaces with Dwarven Bronze.
6. Healthy Thrakka Green wash, repeat as necessary in spots where water would tend to accumulate.
Extra steps that I'd like to do but no time... "speckle" blue-green into areas where water would tend to sit to approximate verdigris scale forming on metal.
Plastruct sells rods in green, blue, red, yellow, purple, clear, white, black. They are about two feet long, in packs of four or five, so you'll have to cut your own.
Please note: The rods for the Necron footsoldiers are different diameters than the rods for the Necron Monolith.
I believe I still have some in my basement, I can get exact measurements if asked.
Yeah the airbrushed rusty men look great Git well done matey!
Will you be doing a Monolith with the airbrush?
or better yet a Pylon/Tomb thingy from FW?
I have spent the last couple of days reading the 32 pages from start to finish, and I must say it has been great to read about your and your childs furray into the 40k universe. Also as others have said I wish my dad was in to Warhammer ah well he used to do modelling and so is a fan of ww2 figures and model railways. OT great blog great painting from Thing 1 (and Thing 2) and I hope your boys continue to love the 40k universe.
Thanks Santaman, and thank you for your perseverance in reading the entire blog. The boys are still doing well, though Thing 1 is pretty discouraged about the non-competiveness of his Necrons. However we have some figures that will help there, just need to get them painted up. The little one is cranked up about his Tyranids... and luckily we have a simple paint scheme that he can contribute to on his own, so that's all good!
While I am probably older than most on dakka... my dad is still around, and he doesn't get it either.
Gitsplitta wrote:though Thing 1 is pretty discouraged about the non-competiveness of his Necrons.
In what sense do you mean Gits, sorry on the gaming side I'm a total noob and I was looking at Necron as a second army, more as a break from painting marines but I'd still like something that when i got the chance to game could at least contend.
It has a lot to do with the units that we have painted up, which are not the best & the fact that his friends don't bother to paint up their armies so they play with lots of tanks, artillery and such while he just has infantry. Add to that the current dex's major weaknesses (phase out mainly) and it's tough for him to feel good about his early experiments.
His luck will improve when we get the better units painted up and running.
whalemusic360 wrote:I'd get that monolith up and running asap then. Its a bitch to kill, even for high S tanks, and is melta/lance proof.
I'm just about to finish up 3 wraiths and the 4th destroyer and he'll be working on his Nightbringer. The next "round" of building and painting will be the monoliths. Once those are done he should be in much better shape.
Wraiths are very interesting units IMHO, that and I always hated building the nightbringer, the seam between the two body parts never seemed to fit the way I wanted them to.
You said monoliths, so how many is thing 1 going to have. I was reading up on GW's Necron tactics and double monoliths seems to be one of the best redundancy tactics for the Crons. That said a Tomb Stalker would be awesome and given it's decent rules it could help add a bit of competitiveness to his army.
I can understand Thing 1 being discouraged about non-competiveness as my brother had the same issues with his first army (Black Templars) as he had only gone with units he liked the look of in a 4th ed codex. And like thing 1 he was one of the few youngsters at the FLGS to have a fully painted army. Unfortunately he then chose CSM as his next army which has caused me nothing but trouble in trying to design a competive list for him. I've also noticed a parallel between my brothers reluctance to sacrifice units in order to further his overall chances of winning and thing 1's. I'm trying to teach him to take more risks.
Anyway, back on topic... you should definitely get a Tomb Stalker.
He's got 2 monoliths, just not put together... and he's saving money for the stalker. Perhaps we'll get a chance to play this weekend & I'll see what I can do with the necrons... at least he can have fun blowing me up! :-)
Gitsplitta wrote:He's got 2 monoliths, just not put together... and he's saving money for the stalker. Perhaps we'll get a chance to play this weekend & I'll see what I can do with the necrons... at least he can have fun blowing me up! :-)
Well that's good to know. Having three Heavy Support choices with tank busting capabilities will make playing Crons more bearable. With any luck he should be able to win a few games against his friends with a competitive HS line up.
If you do manage to arrange a game at the weekend I hope Thing 1 does well.
Oh monoliths are a complete bitch to play against. At least with the upcoming codex they may get some new interesting units as I've heard some complaints of the somewhat limiting nature of the current codex. Although get the deceiver, he's a pain in the ass to play against as well...
I'll pass those comments on to Thing 1 (well... except for the "pain in the ass" one). I'm sure he'll be happy to hear there is relief in sight. Hopefully it won't be too much longer before we can get to the monoliths.
Small update: Picked up some scarabs and a Destroyer Lord at the consignment room of our FLGS to celebrate a good report card. Didn't need much of a re-paint to get them to fit in nicely with Thing 1's army. Finished the scarabs last night. Don't know if they're useful or not, but I know he'll eventually need them to run with his tomb spiders at the very least. Also made progress on his 4th Destroyer... just have the detail work to do on that one & it's finished!
Damn, those scarabs look nice. I particularly like the bases, Dunno why cos they're pretty simple...but hey, less is generally more so who am I to question the proverbs and other such sayings...What I'm trying to say is: nice!
Good Scarab technique:
Attach a Destroyer Lord with warscythe to squad. They do A) Turbo boost, giving the little bastards a +2 cover save (jetbikes get a 3+ with a bonus 1 for small target!) and they make the lord a bitch to kill or B) use the lord to pop vehicles/SCs while using the swarms to bubble wrap him and absorb wounds. They can glance the crap out of stuff with disruptor fields as well.
Or you can put 1-2 on a base and have little comical dirt clumps also on it so it looks like some
are moving underground. and maybe have bits of them showing through the ground.
I actually have a battle report that I need to put together... the Necron's first official action! (he did well) If I get stuck at home by the incoming blizzard I'll work on it.
I was just posting to say how incredible it is how these young folks paint. My ten year old brother did some flames on a LoTD model....they look brilliant, he's got the transition all the way from the yellow at the centre to the red further out....its a little unrefined but still looks fairly professional. If he focussed he'd go really far...
anyway...to the point. This is great for simply encouraging youngsters, especially in an age such as ours where computer games are thrown at children. Keep it up as far as possible Gits!
Imp. Monkey
ps. Well listen to me. 16 and ranting like a 70 year old (no offence intended to anyone in that comment)
Well, I'm closer to 70 than 16... but your observations are still valid. Thing 1 has been slowly working on his Telion counts-as recently. He's not in a hurry and I'm been monopolizing the painting bench as of late... but it's looking good. He always does a much better job when he slows down.
Thanks Nathan, I really appreciate you're sticking with us. Keep in mind that I still do a lot of the detail painting, especially for the little one but still some for the eldest too. Don't want to misrepresent my work as theirs... and getting the kids to take their time and paint carefully is a real challenge. But, when they're motivated... they can do well, and I have hope that they'll come into their own eventually.
Feel free to chime in any time. The Mantis Warrior blog is very interactive so don't worry about giving unwelcome comments... won't happen.
No new pics (I've been preoccupied prepping for Adepticon so I haven't been able to help him work on his Necrons) but... I thought I'd report that Thing 1 went to the local gaming night from kids at our FLGS and was victorious over a Nid player with a couple of fex's, some warriors and lots of gaunts. Apparently the Nid player couldn't close fast enough and the crons just shot them to pieces. Nice to see him get a win.
He also built his first monolith all on his own.... it's a bit crooked and gluey... but it's all his. Not bad...
Once I get back to painting things for the boys we'll have it done in a jiffy.
But how well will it stand up to a railgun shot? I'm eager to see it, looks like you guys went with the standard scheme for crons for the most part but still very impressive work I think you noted it but isn't ironic how he chose another MEQ army?
EDIT: also? wtf is a tomb stalker? I can't find it on GW's site is it a FW model?
yea I found a pic...looks awesome! you should make him help you. Like, it looks like repeating geometry, so have him build the segments. you can show him how and treat the resin and all that, and maybe do a few to show him or build them alongside him. My favorite childhood memories are building the old technic battle droids with my dad, and we'd team up to help make it easier...I think if he can handle the glue from the looks of it he should be able to assemble it with some help of course I'm also assuming its made up of two legs connected to a segment and then just repeated a bazillion times...if i'm wrong you can totally disregard this
Thanks Neil! His army has been languishing as I've totally co-opted the painting bench to get ready for Adepticon, but after that's over... we'll get back to working on his crons.
Ok so it took 2 days off and on to read all this and I have to say wow. I am impressed by all parts of this thread. I have to say that if there were more fathers like you in the world it would be a better world. Keep up the great work, both with your armies and your kids. In 10 years they will look back and truly appreciate all the effort you have put in just to spend more time with them. Hell they probably do now keep up the great work!
Thanks Xmortis, that means a lot. Wish I had more to report... though the boys and I have played several games, just manage never to have the time to write them up properly. Expect more attention to this blog come April.
Well, finally got to play a little game with my eldest after recovering from Adepticon. He took a 500 pt ork army and ran over my little 500 pt space marine army. Painting should resume shortly so we hope to have some things to show soon.
OK guys... FINALLY... after my kids waiting for months for me to get my Adepticon army done... I got a little work done on their armies. I finished up the last of my son's destroyers (it looks like the rest so I'll spare you the photograph). I also finished painting Thing 1's wraith squad. So here's the proof! Long time coming... They aren't real exciting... but they are consistent with the rest of his army.
Wow Gits they look great!
and its nice to see Things 1 and 2's threads back up and running, bet they are glad to be doing some 40k too?
im guessing airbrush for the two (!!) monoliths? cant wait
Revenent Reiko wrote:Wow Gits they look great!
and its nice to see Things 1 and 2's threads back up and running, bet they are glad to be doing some 40k too?
im guessing airbrush for the two (!!) monoliths? cant wait
Yep... played a game with each one this weekend (they won both games) so they're definitely juiced about playing. It's just nice to be working on their stuff again so they're armies keep making progress towards completion.
Yep, all the necron stuff is airbrushed, and the monolith's really call for it with their size and uniformity. Should be an interesting process, but he's really been needing them as necrons are in pretty sad shape as an army without them.
@CG: Thanks! I think that one's got the best pose. I like the tail on the one on the left where all the mechanical bits are exposed and flailing around too.
Been a while since we've had anything to post, but finally some activity!
Thing 1 is trading marines as part of the GMS, and put together this baby out of spare parts from my bits box... I think he's hooked and scratch-building from bits now...
We've both fallen in love with the pre-heresy heads from Chapterhouse... they're just really well done and have so much character.
Out of the box. It's the closest thing to a doom eagle pad we can find. I think it's standard Imperial iconography but it's pretty close (skull on an eagle is Doom Eagle heraldry).
There should be a flurry of activity on his part soon. He wants to experiment running his marines as Blood Angels (the Doom Eagles are BA successor chapter after all), and with some help I think we've got a pretty viable list using mostly the figures he has already. Will have to build a few character types but other than that he should be fine. He does have a lot of painting to do though, so hopefully there will be things to show off soon!
Well, they'll probably echo the rest of the army in general scheme... but I don't have specific details worked out. Perhaps a bit of black around the grooves so the glowing green from underneath shows up that much better.
I should probably get going on one of those... been dragging my heels.
It was really fun to go trough this blog! To follow the progress of your son's army and painting skills and all the fun you guys seem to share! They also do a great job, I sure didn't have a fully painted army for 40k at Thing 1s age (or an army at all), I actually still don't, but going through this blog was really inspiring!
He did all the basic painting, all the detail (initially)... the washing, basic highlights and this was his first experiment with edge highlighting.
I probably did most of the things that make it pop. So... the shading on the eyes, OSL (which I still struggle with), the really fine edge highlighting on the red, the text on the purity seals, are my contributions. That does not change the fact that he did a better, neater job with all of the above then he's ever done before. The figure was clearly "finished" when he was done painting it... I just came in at the end with some techniques that he didn't yet know or hadn't yet mastered (like the fine edge highlighting) in order to give the figure some zing.
Cool think about it is that well... he's 10. And while he is becoming a good painter his attention wanders some times and he has a tendency to rush through things at times, which usually means I have a bit of tidying up to do on one of his figures before we can call it done.
On this one, there was NO tidying up. The only things I did were the advanced techniques he hasn't mastered yet. That's progress. If he can stay focused... he can do a very good job.
Thing 1 done a really nice paint job on the Doom Eagle
I'm going to try and replicate your wraith squad paint job on some Chaos Marines (The Reborn) at some point next month but without an airbrush, I hope the process will work in the same way as they have the same worn armour look.
It should translate decently enough into a normal brush paint job. Kinda simple actually.
Base color (with the airbrush it's a light brown, then a thin bronze over-spray), light golden highlights, sepia wash, then irregular bronze patches/highlights, then green wash.
When you're done, feel free to post a pic here, would love to see the results.
Gitsplitta wrote:Cool think about it is that well... he's 10. And while he is becoming a good painter his attention wanders some times and he has a tendency to rush through things at times, which usually means I have a bit of tidying up to do on one of his figures before we can call it done.
On this one, there was NO tidying up. The only things I did were the advanced techniques he hasn't mastered yet. That's progress. If he can stay focused... he can do a very good job.
He's ridiculously good for his age Gits, and its good to see that he is managing to focus his attention so well at such an early age (i couldnt, still cant ). I bet he starts asking for how to do the advanced techniques soon too
Well it sounds like hes motivated, and it shows in the models hes painting, so that has to be a good sign o and your game against him must have helped for motivation?
Well, he's decided to play his Doom Eagles using the BA codex to make his army a bit more competitive. Since the DA are a BA successor chapter... I've got no problem with it. So, I had another thread asking for advice on how to make the transition and we have a plan... and frankly, if we get the figures painted up for the BA switch, he'll have a great vanilla marine army anyway. So... (ramble, ramble)... yes, our game and getting to load up on me playing his own necrons is a motivation.
A bigger motivation I think.. is the whole GMS thing though, which he's really bought in to. He's seen me have so much fun, and really push my skills for my trades, that he wants to try it for himself. And the way he's responded has been very promising.
No kidding, worst SM codex with out a doubt! Have to be some kind of masochist to play them...
...Anyways, I got both yours and his Dark Angels packed up, I'll send em out this week.
Lets see if I have this correct: Thing 1 is going to be using his Doom Eagles as Blood Angels, and WhaleMusic is sending Thing 1 Dark Angels for the GMS?
Alfndrate wrote:Man this small back and forth confused me lol.
Lets see if I have this correct: Thing 1 is going to be using his Doom Eagles as Blood Angels, and WhaleMusic is sending Thing 1 Dark Angels for the GMS?
Alright, thought so, just making sure (also I had to google some info on the Doom Eagles, and some of your photos from the earlier parts of the blog were the top images in google
Oh yes... I'm so famous. A "Mantis Warriors" search shows I have one image in the top 5, the rest (what few there are) are on pages 2 and 3. Funny thing is that the one top image is Telion that dakkaites apparently hate with the heat of 1000 suns (4.4/4.2). I love that little figure! Can't figure out why it's so despised by the voters... kinda funny actually.
Nice work from Thing 1! my first mini I painted myself ended up black, red, gold, and green...not suprisingly it looked crap, but this boy's got some latent painting talent right there! can't wait to be following Dakka in 8 years or so when he's winning golden Demon awards :-)
I'll make sure he sees your compliments, I'm sure he'll be grateful. I have fiddled with the eyes since the photo and probably need to tweak them some more... I'm so used to doing my Mantis Warrior style gem eyes that I've kind of forgotten how to do normal glowing marine eyes.
I'm just glad that he's excited about playing and working on things again. It's been months really since he's shown much interest. I hope he does well in our game, though I'm not going to hand it to him... he's going to have to work for it.
Gitsplitta wrote:It should translate decently enough into a normal brush paint job. Kinda simple actually.
Base color (with the airbrush it's a light brown, then a thin bronze over-spray), light golden highlights, sepia wash, then irregular bronze patches/highlights, then green wash.
When you're done, feel free to post a pic here, would love to see the results.
Well here we go this is the first of The Reborn, I changed the above process slightly by doing the highlights in gold before the green wash instead of bronze so he stayed a bit light like in the codex.
In the codex it states that they have antiquated weponary so I may look at some older style armour and weapons from forge world when I do the rest of the squad.
If you really want to make him look aged, take some dilute Hawk Turquoise and put it in the deepest recesses and cracks. I always mean to do that with the Necrons but there are just so many of them I talk myself out of it.
Another way to do it if the model is unpainted is base coat it hawk turquoise, or a nice blue-green, then drybrush heavily so it is in the recesses, just be careful with washes, so as not to obscure it too much.
We're in the process of trying to make Thing 1's army a bit more competitive, primary with some new things painted up and a switch to the BA dex. He's finishing up some other half-done projects, while I work on his land raider. Here's what we have so far. Just a simple patter of silver (airbrushed), black and red (brush painted). I know the flamer is upside down. I bought this used... not my fault. If I could figure out how to get the flamers out I'd switch them. I think I'll keep the painting on this one clean and simple. He can add extra details on his own later if he desires.
Is it me or is the door upside down as well, the skulls the wrong way up.
Not sure but for the flamer you might be able to cut it out then add a pole all the way through and put it back in if you see what I mean then it would still be moveable. I guess the other side is the same so they need swapping round.
But by the looks of things, the previous owner didn't look when he was gluing
You could file off the skull and x bones but it would still leave the ladder looking odd.
Although as you are building to game rather than show off, it should be ok.
I would try and wiggle out the flamestorm cannons and put them in the right way up and file off the ladder and skulls,
maybe then either redesign the ladder or just fill the gaps out with GS.
If you want to have a ladder, why not use a plastruct ladder? They are cheap enough and would add a bit more flavour to the tank and would cover up the damage left from removing the upside down one.
Interesting suggestions. I'll definitely try and flip the cannons. Not sure how I'll handle the doors but I'll think on it. Considering he's been playing with this unpainted LR for a year or so and no one's noticed anything wrong I'm not sure how much it'll matter. I can get rid of the skull, but the ladder may have to stay (we'll see).
Seems like the whole sponson is on upside down. Depending on the glue used (if it was just superglue, or even PVa, that is,) it might actually be able to carefully trim about the edges and pull the whole thing out. If it was plastic cement, though, yeah, you'll have to do some chopping to get it right ways up. Note the aiming thingy on the bottom as well.
Cant remember if the plastic rod runs right through both ends of the sponson, if it does, cut the atrgetters free, drill in the to of the pole and pin the targetter in place.
As for skulls, gs the teeth smooth and a bit wider for the forehead, thiny gs on the bottom of the skull with notches for teeth and if feeling adventurous use knife to make 2 holes for the nostrils. Hopefully the skull will not be too out of proportion... Ladder looks okay infact the door would be fine as i looks hinged at the bottom and the handle at the top for pulling open in emergencies.
You just need to prise the cannons out from their housing in the land raider's body and then switch the sides.
The painting looks good though. The ladder just grinds at the eyes however, ruining an otherwise very nice look! A little bit of Git magic (that sounds offensive, opps) should solve it...
Hey Gits, hows the LR coming along?
Shame about the upside-down build (my LRC has its Hurricane bolters upside down because i wasnt paying attention when i put it together all those years ago ).
It does look good overall though, the Silver looks really smooth and the red really 'pops'!
I was going to post an update... thanks for reminding me.
Coming along nicely. I got both gun housings off. Did have a break or two but nothing I can't pin and fix. In a way it worked out as it's allowing me to paint the flamers with much more detail than I'd attempt otherwise and I think they're looking really good. Give me a day or two to finish the painting and rebuilding (and I have to finish paining the other side of the LR) and I'll post a pic.
The doors are going to stay as they are (i.e. there's no way to get them out). It's not worth destroying the paint job on the tank just to fix the ladder, but perhaps I can come up with some sort of smoke-and-mirrors to distract from it.
OK, guns are re-built and decently painted. Unfortunately you can't see most of the detail from this angle but that's how it goes. Next I have to paint the other side to match. I was pretty happy that I was able to re-assemble and pin the guns without losing their motion, which is one of the neater things about the modern Land Raiders.
And just so you don't think I'm the only one painting. He just finished up his Doom Eagle version of Sgt. Telion for his scouts (when he wants to run them as vanilla marines). He pretty much did this all by himself, including getting disgusted with his first attempt, stripping it and starting all over again. I helped with the highlights and wash on the cloak and face... other than that it's all him!
Well done on the LR Gits, shaping up nicely, and it musnt have been easy.
Telion looks great, congrats to Thing 1! I absolutely love the beard (i dont know why the beard in particular....), and the rest of the mini is looking really good too, say well done to him for me
He's getting there. Sometimes is painting efforts resemble an episode of "Short Attention Span Theater"... but then again he's only 10... so I remember to cut him some slack once in a while. :-)
I must say that looks rather good! the shading is rather nice though i must say the upside down doors and guns are an interesting take you could spray on a black or dark wash on the lower metallic area if you wanted to push the contrast but i do rather like is how it is keep it up
It never occurred to me before but having the LR doors with the hinges on the bottom makes more sense, the door would then drop down and form a ramp for the marines to walk down when the disembark, handy!
Fixed the Telion thing. I'm using a 32" TV as a computer monitor but I sit about 6' away from it... so little typos like the extra "i" I don't even notice.
Never fear... he was admiring his paint job just a little while ago... his ego is just fine.
whalemusic360 wrote:Did the sensor things on the sponsons get lost in the fix? Looks much better regardless, and Scout Master *Insert name here* is looking great too!
I have one to still attach. There wasn't a second with this model but perhaps I can scrounge one up somewhere... I'm not too worried about it.
Alfndrate wrote:To be honest, I never noticed the spelling mistake. So when is Thing 1 gonna start his own thread
Alfndrate wrote:To be honest, I never noticed the spelling mistake. So when is Thing 1 gonna start his own thread
When he does enough work to justify one.
Off to lock my thread
Though I do think he may still be on the internets in places such as these. I'm sure you'd just love to hear "Hey Dad, can we CRASSUS ASSAULT TRANSPORT this weekend?" all the friggin time.
Though I do think he may still be on the internets in places such as these. I'm sure you'd just love to hear "Hey Dad, can we CRASSUS ASSAULT TRANSPORT this weekend?" all the friggin time.
And suddenly Thing 1's thread surpasses all of ours and we pale before him.
Though I do think he may still be on the internets in places such as these. I'm sure you'd just love to hear "Hey Dad, can we CRASSUS ASSAULT TRANSPORT this weekend?" all the friggin time.
Heresy detected! You forgot the ARMOURED part
Gits, whats next on Thing 1's chopping block? More marines, some Blood Angels stuff? don't keep us in suspense
He's working a terminator (one of the really old ones) that I've modified to carry an assault cannon. that's the last of his unfinished projects. Then it's off to his assault terminators!
Gitsplitta wrote:OK, guns are re-built and decently painted. Unfortunately you can't see most of the detail from this angle but that's how it goes. Next I have to paint the other side to match. I was pretty happy that I was able to re-assemble and pin the guns without losing their motion, which is one of the neater things about the modern Land Raiders.
Having the guns in the front and the doors in the back has always made more sense to me !! It's that whole thing with not wanting to walk out the door and get your head blown off in 1 of several different ways I seem to remeebr that if you actually read the instrcutions they even tell you to do it this way... too bad it doesn;t match the picture on the box!
The Assault termies are coming along quite nicely! Nice work Thing 1!
@Gitsplitta Thanks for taking the time to document this! There are websites where you can make books of things like forum posts, pictures, etc. Might be a really nice way to celebrate getting the army 'finished'.
My oldest is three, and he 'paints' some army men with my rinse water when I paint. He has a lot of fun, and reminds me to pace myself.
How's Thing #1 handling the Necron rumor mill?
Hey Anpu, welcome to the blog! Does one ever actually "finish" an army?? I think all of mine are open ended as there are endless variations to noodle with and paint. Though I hope to get Thing 1's more or less set and completed within the next year.
He's pretty casual about it. Once he figured out how flawed the Necron rules were his excitement ebbed a bit, but the possibility of a new dex breathing some life into them is always good. There are a couple of Necron builds that can be reasonably successful, but most involve spamming of one unit or another, and that's not what he's got at the moment. So from time to time he works on them... and I don't push him.
Letting the little one "paint", whatever form that takes... is a good thing!
logg_frogg wrote:
Having the guns in the front and the doors in the back has always made more sense to me !! It's that whole thing with not wanting to walk out the door and get your head blown off in 1 of several different ways I seem to remeebr that if you actually read the instrcutions they even tell you to do it this way... too bad it doesn;t match the picture on the box!
The Assault termies are coming along quite nicely! Nice work Thing 1!
Its actually correct for the redeemer to have them forward, and the others to have them behind the doors.
It makes sense to have it forward using real world logic, but in game, you'd be hard pressed to get a decent sized unit out the side door an in coherency. Its more useable in front.
Well, when you look at the Crusader, 24 inch range won't make too much of a difference with the space of a door getting in the way (But I can get a full 10 man tac squad + Vulkan out of the front hatch within 2 inches) so my crusader doesn't really care lol. But with the redeemer, the doors on the front would mean that you have a better range with the use of your template.
Normal Land Raider has the las cannons on the back doors.
Any words of experience you can give to a fellow father? My five (and a half, as he reminds me) year old is wanting to paint and play like daddy. I have scrounged up, with help from friends, a space marine army for him to play. He's chosen salamanders as his chapter. Do you have advice about what I might expect (thinking about how thing 2 did)?
Expect a lot more enthusiasm than patience. That's OK, just roll with it. What I would do is give him a very simple task (with teaching of course) like priming. Then painting on the base coat, then washing, then a dry brush highlight. Each step would involve a teaching phase, letting Thing 2 try it, then me touching it up afterwards. That way they get decent looking figures that they really have had a hand in building. Then once your son and you have done the basics together... if you want, you can add some details on your own to make the figure look a little nicer.
Remember to keep your games very simple and straight forward. Just a few guys, simple objectives, especially ones that can be achieved without necessarily getting into a major fire fight. Give him like 4 marines and one special weapon and just try and concentrate on one aspect of the game. Then you can change the special weapons around, or add a special CCW or something like that. Disadvantage yourself a bit at first too, so he get's the fun of winning.
As you go, you can slowly pass more and more of the burden over to him, but remember at his age, he just won't be able to do the detail work and probably won't have the patience to get every little bit painted smoothely. I'm a big fan of the Armory colored primers, and they make a nice green... perfect for the salamanders. Help him use the spray can and paint the figs (he probably won't have the finger strength to hold the button on the spray can down on his own), then do a simple green or red wash... then a rudimentary dry brush highlight. You paint a black pad & help him with the bolt gun metal and you're pretty much done!
Best of luck. It's a really wonderful thing to share with your child.
just spent the entire afternoon reading this blog from start to finish, this is an amazing read i cant wait to see the thing 1s progression. Hepaints a hole lote better than i do. kudos to him. makes me wish i had my own to teacht hem this awesome hobby. ill get there one day. getting ready to read over thing 2s blog next great stuff at any point. lookin for more!
oh i bet well lookin forward to what they got. any updates on thing ones crons or is he still fiddling with the doom eagles or is he flip floppin between the two?
Automatically Appended Next Post: Gitsplitta and company,
yall have inspired me to attempt my first objective marker i have plans for four more but for now one is good hopefully ill have pics of it soon then yall can critque it or tell me how badly it blows either way im lookin forward to hearing from some btter modlers than me.
Hey alabama! Objective markers are a lot of fun because they often use a bit bigger base and don't have to follow any formula... so you can really "play" with them. I've got two new ones in the works for my marines. (actually using a chaos marine that I got in a trade to make one of them)
When you get it done let me know. I'll start an "objective marker" showcase thread and you can post it there (unless you want to start your own thread for it. I've made a ton of objectives over the years so it wouldn't be just you.
git that would be cool i would post int hat thread i already got one done gonna start the second one soon, let me know when you are goin to do that thread and ill send ya my pic. i really didnt have intentions startin a thread about them actually.
Finish the second one, they we'll post them both along with mine. Bet there are some really nice objective markers out there if we give folks a chance to post them.
awesome! hope he had a good time, i been reading your mw blog also started at the begging and working my way forward. i know kinda maschoist (sp?) anyrate hope to see stuff from him soon necrons or other wise.
of course he's young i know he prolly has other hobbies besides warhammer. and he is still doin the scouts thing right? sorry if that seemed a lil personal i was in scouts and i think its a good thing thats all.
git dunno if you saw my post in the gms but i started my own thread and thought you could send some of the fantastic minds of your blogs over to my little end of the world. here is my link again
well i would love to have some fantastic minds helping me out cuase im kinda stumped atm, has either of the things done anything yet or they still off enjoying the summer sun so to speak ill trade your 80degree weather for random tstorms and 110 heat index with 50 percent humidity
Actually Thing 1 has been very busily painting lately... it's a 40k'd up ork boar rider! He just got a bee in his bonnet to be doing an ork (been working on mine so I guess it rubbed off) and he's really taking his time on him. No idea what we're going to do with him, but it's the most interest he's shown in painting in months, so we'll just go with it.
I had a plan for my orks to us cyboars as a nob bike unit... I even managed to accumulate three cyboars before realizing that the project would make me broke (old cyboars command a pretty hefty price). His is just a normal boar though. I could however, toss him in along with the rest... it's just not modeled very well as a proxy (no dakka guns, just an ork w/ pistol and axe on a boar)...
We'd hoped to add it to the grot mob of the Waaaaagh Dakka as a kind of "squig hound" but our ranks have filled up quickly now... perhaps I can count him as Cybergit's attache' or something.
Message rider? Give him some pouches and a sattelite dish or something I'm sure Morecambe and Wise did a sketch a loooong time ago about a military messenger wandering between command posts and having a glass of port at each, getting progressively drunker and leading to the charge of the lgiht brigade
Saturday?? OH, the Necron roll out... well, I'll pick up something for him for his good grades last trimester. Won't get painted right away but will probably push it near the top of his to do list.
Yep... (took him long enough). Actually the boys had a game against each other last week and did a great job! Have all the pics, just need to cobble together a batrep.
First post down and i must say this is going to be an excellent read. My two boys are both 6 and 9 and have taken increased interest in my minis and likewise im wanting to get them involved, looks like you may just help out with this!
Now i must be off to finish reading all these pages
Good luck Freeboota... It's an interesting ride with a lot of quandaries unanswered yet. One thing I just realized that that a large part of my eldest not wanting to play recently is that he's tired of playing ME all the time. The game where they boys played each other with me just GMing went a long way in reinvigorating their interest in 40k.
If you have any insights as you go, please post them. I'd welcome other parent's ideas and experiences.
Why not go ahead and take them to some stores? I can't speak for other people, but if you lived in my area or vice versa, I'd be happy to play youngins'.
I think there's a lot of nice folks out there who don't mind playing kids, as long as they are "mature", or simply well mannered.
Thing 1's been working on a HB scout for a painting competition. The only thing I've done on this figure is to drill the barrel of the gun & give technical advice. Still WIP, but getting there.
Safely into Christmas Eve... here's the Christmas gift...
New bases on everything save the scarabs (will do them too... just ran out of time), will also make up some new scarab bases next week. Painted his Spyders, two whip coil wraiths, two monoliths and re-painted his destroyer lord. Hope you enjoy the pics!
Don't mind the messily built 'liths.... he's just learning and they'll be a good reminder for him later to take his time.
Merry Christmas for all who celebrate, peace and good health to everyone!
Your son's painting is spot-on. Just have him remember that with the eyes of his scout that he can always go back and touch up. When I was his age, I was painting up the 1980's style busman's rangers for a competition (that I was unable to attend ) I spent about an hour trying to get the eyes right. I finally did, and it was worth the bragging rights and awe I got from the others I got at my gaming club.
@CK: Stole the blue from the new dex but the balls of light & swirlies were my idea.
@killy: I'll do that killy... he did really well for a figure he did entirely on his own. I think he can do whatever he wants, just a matter of his being patient enough to stick with it. Time will tell.
Here's a bit of unfinished business... needed to make some extra scarabs to go along with the Canptek Spyders. Had 5 of the good bases left and conveniently 5 bases worth of scarabs. Decided to make 3 of the bases "wound counters" with removable scarabs (magnetized). Figured he was unlikely to need more than that.
That's a super cool idea, magnetizing the scarabs. I think that you are going to need to make a lot more scarabs, however. I've started a game with 10 scarabs (only 150 points) and I've had as many as 16 on the table at one time!
Thanks... well, with these he's got 11 total... just ran out of scarabs. I have plans for building a few of the wargear scarab bases as well as some more of these guys... just need to get the little guys... and more bases. Plenty of time for that though.
Next project is painting his IC's (Imhotek & one other named character plus a cryptek).
Well, his first game with the new units and rules is complete! He did quite well. 2000 pt game vs. a footdar army that I put together. We actually used the wound counter aspect of the scarab bases too. Gotta love that!
Battle report to follow sometime soon. I'll post when I have it up.
No Orminah, sorry... however the painting style is *very* formulaic... i.e. any idiot with an airbrush and some GW washes could duplicate it. So luckily for you I don't need to adopt you for you to paint in a similar fashion yourself!
BTW, I'm working on the battle report for his first battle with the new army... going to be a good one!
I think maxmini or one of the other polish companies has their own design for them now... 4 different variations which are pretty neat. I just used the ones we had on hand, but now we're out too. He's got 11 bases worth all-together... that should get him by for a while.
After some checking...
Puppetswar does some nice "cyber beetles". 10 for $7.50 US (roughly) which isn't a bad deal.
Imhotek is a pain for any shooty armies -_- all that night-fighting and lightning its great cover for advancing the troops just dont plan on any long range shooting yourself lol (necron player i went against recently learned that the hard way lol)
yeah, I saw some GW ones going on ebay for $10AU (actually, it was closer to 9, but oh well)
but no bases... I'm thinking of buying both the ones avalible, but then I'd have no bases...
which would mean either buying themfrom GW, or finding ome on ebay/else where...
I got very lucky in our game... two successive turns of night fight and not one successful lightening strike. Not a very good debut for his new dakka dice!
When i played the necrons it was night fighting for 3 turns and on the fourth it went away and before he could use his doomsday arc finally on the fourth turn i dropped my dreadnaught and multi-melta'd it and turned it into a big crater
Actually the scarabs got tarpitted by a bunch of guardians then countercharged by a full squad of harlequins & the avatar. However, they did show how a first turn assault is easily accomplished, so it was a good debut for them.
Update: Still working on the things I wanted to have done for Christmas but ran out of time. Have the basics done for Imhotek, "the Infinate" guy and a cryptek. Not bad so far...
Yeah... they're turning out OK. I'm scratching my head a bit about what to do from here. I tend to be rather minimalist with the 'crons as the basic color works really well and if I have the fluff right... they were all "necronized" in one fell swoop so I imagine the results would be pretty consistent across the race. Some contrast and counterpoint in color always seems to help though, I just need to pick my areas carefully. I need to sort out the blades and glowing energy globes and runes that are scattered throughout... then we'll see where they stand.
Also got blue on Trajen's foot... will have to fix that as it's not consistent with the rest of the model. These are all just tacked on to their bases for painting, when I'm done I'll remove them and put them on proper skull bases like the rest of the army.
As to the "finecast"....
I didn't see many problems with these figures, one or two small bubbles in obscure places... didn't even bother fixing them to be honest. My biggest issue is that the staves are all twisty and bent. Kinda goofy looking for metal creatures. I'm still very uncomfortable working with it as it's so flexible & seems to break easily (which is tough as I usually drop every figure I paint 2 or 3 times during the painting process). It reacts quickly to heat, but seems to spring back well enough and if you hold it in place allows some re-positioning. It also does not melt like regular plastic does (i.e. you can re-position plastic bits with say... a heat gun if you're very careful, but in doing so the piece will lose some of it's shape). This resin seems to become malleable at a lower temperature than it melts at, thus you can move it without melting it. (not sure how that works, but that's my experience) Be careful though as it "goes soft" all-of-a-sudden and can catch you quite unawares.
Looking great! I love the wraiths and spiders! the scheme really makes them stand out and look aged and,well..... just plain looks good! :-) also the Necron Santa titan! is that 2nd or 3rd wave?
nerdfest09 wrote:Looking great! I love the wraiths and spiders! the scheme really makes them stand out and look aged and,well..... just plain looks good! :-) also the Necron Santa titan! is that 2nd or 3rd wave?
2nd. It's an effort to subdue humans my making them think a cultural icon is actually a Necron (sort of the opposite of the Nightbringer/death incarnate thing).
A necron titan is a *very* curious idea... OK, found one! 18" tall, fully articulated with light-up eyes, removable gun and a spare hand.... sounds perfect for modification. Just a bit of repainting to get him to look like the rest of the army and some converting to make him look more "lordly" (and new guns)... and I'll be set! Now all I need is some rules. Seriously... if I had rules I'd order one of these immediately & start painting/converting the day it arrived.
Fifty wrote:I love the cloaks. Is that a hawk turquoise? And is it over silver, or the same colour as the rest of the 'cron?
Also, any likelihood of Thing 1 going back to his marines at any stage? And has he done much painting himself recently?
Also, looking forward to the batrep (no pressure though! ;-) )
It's over the same gold/bronze as the rest... though there are boltgun metal bits on each figure. It's two washes of hawk turquoise, followed by a drybrush of a mix of turquoise and emerald green, then a final light drybrush of dwarven bronze in certain areas to bring a bit of the matallic back into the cloak.
Thing one still works on his marines once in a while. That scout heavy bolter was his latest effort (and done entirely on his own). He's anxious to learn airbrushing so he can paint his own 'crons.
@Sage: just google "terminator, action figure", it pops right up. $40 and it's yours I could really do that thing up & make it look appropriate... like a giant Necron Lord/Overlord. Be a fun project but without rules it would be a lot of time spent on something unusable.
@Matt: OK, fixed my post. (actually I originally wrote that I "fexed" my post... got Nids on my mind I guess). Boy am I having a day... my brain is still on vacation.
Imotekh WIP2... FINALLY got my camera set up correctly!! Yippie... real color for a change.
One of the problems with having Thing 1 do the sprue removal and assembly is that there are a bunch a little tags all over this thing that I didn't recognize as such and painted over... now I have my work cut out for me to remove them and get the damage covered up. All things being equal... I think it's coming along well. The blend on the weapon is a little nicer than the picture shows, and the orbs are not quite as nice... but the overall effect is good.
That's not a bad suggestion polari... perhaps some mild OSL (small halo of medium green around the symbols & then pick them out with the same bright green as the other glowing elements).
Thanks to polari and Ifalna, this is pretty close to done, I just have to figure out what I want to do with the head. It can stay like this & just add green to the eyes and runes. But I think the silver down low needs a counter-balance up high, so I'm considering making the non-green parts of the helm in the same silver as the weapon haft and loin cloth.
Not with the airbrush, the figure is much too small for that. The closest I could come using a brush would look something like the energy sphere on his staff but in shades of turquoise.
)
) would be to change their green weapons, I know they come with them like that, but I think another color would look very good with that goldish color. I am thinking of red, but blue would be nice. It would also make them seem very different than most necron armies!
) explain in a step-by-step how you paint them?
looks close enough to the 
), cool to see him up Googles front page of images 
), and the rest of the mini is looking really good too, say well done to him for me 
