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The use of the stealth heads on your Crisis Suits and broadside, has totally transformed the model so much better than the original heads. It should be the way they come in the box. Great work.

Very cool Broadsides.

It reminds me of an Anime I saw once.

:-)

ArbitorIan wrote:

flaim wrote:I actually saw (and posted a response) in the post that was a battle report so I am reposting this here as to not derail that one too much more.

I have been trying to get a yellow to work for my Trollbloods for a while now and the yellow of your vehicles is pretty much what I was looking for. I wanted to make sure I had your process down so I could steal it (if you don't mind).

1) Prime with Montana Gold Mango?
2) Ink with yellow ink
3) Wash with mix of sepia, red and black mixed together?

Thanks a bunch and great work!
Flaim

No worries. It's actually a bit simpler.

I prime with GW Skull White spray, then spray yellow. I use the Montana Gold range, as they're readily available all over the UK, and come in 300 different colours. However, any spray acrylic-based paint should be fine. Mango has actually been discontinued by Montana, but they have similar shades (and about 10 shades of yellow anyway ) Sugar Lemon is their next closest.

I then have a custom wash mix made up. It's a pot of Gryphonne Sepia with about 15 drops of Baal Red and Badab Black added each. I do a single wash of this (NOT a dip), paying attention to the grooves, and brushing off any pools that form on flat areas before they dry. That's it.

For vehicles, I don't do a complete wash. I carefully paint the wash mix into the grooves of the vehicle. I find that the large, flat areas of the vehicles mean that it's very hard to stop the wash from pooling before it dries, so I manually paint in the grooves.

Hope that's helpful!

EDIT

Just read your post in the other thread - this (above) is the second method I tried. My Tau were originally sprayed with Burtlack Lemon Yellow spray (again, available from most good Grpahic shops, but expensive) and then washed with the old GW Yellow Ink. This is the first way shown in that P&M blog - the spray colour is very very pale, almost green. It worked, but when I came to repaint the army I found that I couldn't get hold of Yellow Ink any more.

The models that you see above, and in that battle report, are done using the second method - the Montana Mango and Custom Wash method I detail above. I think it actually gives much better depth.

Which method was the vehicles and which method was the suits? It seems from the pictures that there is an almost orange sheen to the suits. From that I assume the suits were done with your technique of the custom wash instead of the ink. I actually like both colors, but I am thinking the vehicle color would suit my trolls better.

flaim wrote:Which method was the vehicles and which method was the suits? It seems from the pictures that there is an almost orange sheen to the suits. From that I assume the suits were done with your technique of the custom wash instead of the ink. I actually like both colors, but I am thinking the vehicle color would suit my trolls better.

They were both undercoated white and sprayed yellow. The suits and infantry then had an all-over wash of my Super Custom Mix. For the vehicles, the wash was carefully painted in the grooves only, as I didn't want it pooling on the large flat areas. That's why the suits look slightly darker/oranger than the vehicles.

SOOO, another week away - this time I'm working in Germany all week, so I've brought along some painting work to do. The next three Devilfish bodies, and the black and grey paints. When I get back, all I should need to do is the white and blue markings.

I've also decided that the fourth unpainted Devilfish was too far gone for salvage, and is going to become some interesting terrain. I've replaced it with a Sky Ray kit direct from eBay. So, only ONE more Devilfish hull to paint after these three!

How big is this army gonna be when finished? Because you have around 6 Devilfish! I admire your determination!

_Tim?

Wow this is the first time Ive stumbled across your army and Im really impressed. Not only do they look really nice on the table, but clear bases!?! What a brilliant idea. Where did you get those again? I really think I might steal that idea for my Orks, The way they blend into the terrain is so much cooler

Best looking Tau I have seen in a long time.. any sniper drones?

Thanks everyone!

Some_Call_Me_Tim? wrote:How big is this army gonna be when finished? Because you have around 6 Devilfish! I admire your determination!

I think it's around 6000pts, but there's no 'set' list because of all the magnetisation!

KingCracker wrote:Wow this is the first time Ive stumbled across your army and Im really impressed. Not only do they look really nice on the table, but clear bases!?! What a brilliant idea. Where did you get those again? I really think I might steal that idea for my Orks, The way they blend into the terrain is so much cooler

The clear bases are from Fenrisgames.co.uk - you can order to have made as many as you need, and they're very cheap. If you're in the US then Litko Aerosystems also do custom clear bases. The shipping to the UK was REALLY high, though, and I found that Fenris were much cheaper even before shipping. Of course, if you're odering from Litko, you may want to take advantage of their amazing Space Corridor system...

Miss Dee wrote:Best looking Tau I have seen in a long time.. any sniper drones?

Thanks - YES, there will be some eventually, but they will be custom built, rather than the off-the-shelf ones...

All the basic greys finished. Tomorrow I'll get the grey highlights and lining done, then back to London...

Found some yellow ink for you.

http://www.waylandgames.co.uk/Privateer-Press/Paints-and-Tools/P3-Paints/PIP-93014-Yellow-Ink/prod_5388.html

Miss Dee wrote:Found some yellow ink for you.

http://www.waylandgames.co.uk/Privateer-Press/Paints-and-Tools/P3-Paints/PIP-93014-Yellow-Ink/prod_5388.html

Well, thanks very much for remembering me! But I'm kinda wedded to my yellow/red Wash mix now, and I might be a bit too far in to change inks!

----

SO, had a geek morning, and managed to assemble and paint some extras for the vehicles, as well as finish off the three Devilfish I started while away in Germany. I made the following..

- A Sky Ray turret, magnetised, with six magnetised Seeker Missiles
- Four Burst Cannon weapon systems for the Hammerheads/Sky Ray, with the good, covered, Burst Cannons
- Six regular drones for weapon systems, sprayed but not finished
- Three 'B-Team' Devilfish finished off.

Here's the haul, as well as an assembled Sky Ray with my new Bust Cannon systems. The Seeker missiles and Markerlights are tipped in green, which is the colour I'm using for all 'Marker' weapons. I used half of the Markerlight assembly on the Sky Ray wingtips, as I thought the full, long one looked a bit ungainly. The Seeker missiles attach to the Skyray individually, but the magnet poles are such that, when I'm not using the Skyray, they also attach to the additional magnet I put on all the vehicle hulls.

Not looking forward to having that Skyray shooting at me...

Very nice vehicles, I noticed that the burst cannon's mounting in the skyray looks slightly different from my own. Did you end up changing the top cover of the discs to remove the little light that normally sits there or did you just use normal drones discs instead? I also just recently put together and magnetized my skyray kit (as a hammerhead for now) so I noticed the difference.

Also, did you magnetize the burst cannons themselves so that you could swap them out for smart missile system or was that not a concern?

I love your color scheme, it looks quite striking. Keep up the good work

Tychron wrote:Very nice vehicles, I noticed that the burst cannon's mounting in the skyray looks slightly different from my own. Did you end up changing the top cover of the discs to remove the little light that normally sits there or did you just use normal drones discs instead? I also just recently put together and magnetized my skyray kit (as a hammerhead for now) so I noticed the difference. Also, did you magnetize the burst cannons themselves so that you could swap them out for smart missile system or was that not a concern? I love your color scheme, it looks quite striking. Keep up the good work

Thanks

I got the models for this army from a variety of trades and swaps, and a lot of the vehicles weren't complete. I didn't have enough of the 'weapon system' discs (the ones with the little light) to go around, especially since I wanted lots of options, so I decided to use the normal drone discs for everything.

I didn't magnetise the burst cannons themselves for these weapon systems - they're attached to the grey 'drone' disc (as you can see in the top photo). I just have lots of grey discs with Burst Cannons and SMS on them, and then yellow discs for regular Gun Drones.

However, I DO have some magnetised burst cannons, which are on the front mounting of the vehicles. Since any of the vehicles can be Devilfish, I attached the 'sensor' nose to everything. I then put a magnet in the side that allows me to attach a nose-Burst Cannon for when the vehicle is a Devilfish.






Automatically Appended Next Post:
And a little experiment. I have TONS of drones, and a load of spare pulse rifles. Add some thinly-sliced matchsticks and a downward-facing aerial, and we have a simple converted Sniper Drone! Hurrah. Only eight more to go...

Right, I'm off on another work trip - a week and a half in Southampton. I've assembled a little hobby case that fits in my suitcase. We have...

- 12 Fire Warriors with Pulse Carbines
- Odd Fire Warriors with Pulse Rifles and Pathfinders to fill out a couple more squads
- Gun Drones for Vehicles
- Shield Drones
- Sniper Team
- 2 Hazard Suit bodies

Let's see what I can get done in my downtime...

6ed Update

So, the project is back and I've updated the first post. Time to add to the army a bit for 6ed. I'm planning to add some flyers and some of the bigger suits, as well as a contingent of Allied IG (Gue'vesa).

I've started with the XV9 suits that have been sitting, sprayed yellow, in a box since (looks at last post) 2011. I've had to remove their heads and shoulder pads to make them a bit easier to paint.



I've then assembled all the bits for the Remora Drones, and magnetised the front parts of their seeker missiles so I can keep track during the game. Here they are with the Fusion Blasters for the XV9s.




We also got a game in at the weekend with 6ed. The Tau did pretty well against the Kan Wall, but I'm hoping the Remoras will be ready before I have to play Necrons!

Looking good! At this point, I'm holding off on buying more tau as I don't frankly know what new stuff will be added to the army and my carrying case is already completely full. I'm surprised that you went with the xv9 suits this late in the game.

Ooh! Self-necro! Good to see you back in action Ian, looking forward to more.

inmygravenimage wrote:Ooh! Self-necro! Good to see you back in action Ian, looking forward to more.

YES. It's ok if you do it yourself, right?

warboss wrote:Looking good! At this point, I'm holding off on buying more tau as I don't frankly know what new stuff will be added to the army and my carrying case is already completely full. I'm surprised that you went with the xv9 suits this late in the game.

All the models are already bought, they've just been in pieces for years. It's just a matter of which to assemble in this batch! I'm not sure what will happen to XV9s but they're relatively new models - I'd be surprised if they were dropped (though I'm not sure they'll make the Codex).

 ArbitorIan wrote:
All the models are already bought, they've just been in pieces for years. It's just a matter of which to assemble in this batch! I'm not sure what will happen to XV9s but they're relatively new models - I'd be surprised if they were dropped (though I'm not sure they'll make the Codex).

Forgeworld has never completely dropped a unit that I know of.. they just occasionally simply disappear from the 2nd edition of an older book when and if its done. In my case, I like the rules and am interested in the suits but don't own any and would rather wait to see if they go plastic with the next codex redo. Since you've already got them, that's a whole different ballgame and I'd do the same if I were in your shoes.

Here's the XV9s - not sure why they came out so grainy, and with different WB settings, but anyway these are in-progress photos. They're not quite finished, but good enough for the game tomorrow...

yeah,
scary!

Panic...

I love your yellow. this is great! thank you for sharing.

Panic wrote:yeah,
scary!

Those are d3 shot meltaguns on each arm...

eldartau1987 wrote:I love your yellow. this is great! thank you for sharing.

Thanks!

----

BUSY DAY. The first Remora is base coated and assembled - I'll probably only get one ready in time for tomorrow - we'll see if I get time in the morning to do anything...

Have you got any WIP shots of how to convert the XV8s with the Stealth Suit heads?

 dangermouse425 wrote:
Have you got any WIP shots of how to convert the XV8s with the Stealth Suit heads?

Woo! Long time to reply. No, I don't have any WIP shots, but it was really easy. I just carved off as much of the back of the stealth suit head as possible, and chopped the head mounting ring and centre part of the torso from the crisis suit, then used a bit of GS to fill the small gap. Really, really easy. It was the legs that were difficult!

-----------------------------------------------

PHASE 3 - 6ed Tau Codex Update!!


So, I've finally come back to these and with the release of the new codex, I'm on a Tau roll!! The plan is to convert up some new units, and finish some old ones. Current shortlist is as follows...

- FLYERS!! I don't like the new model, so I'll be building and painting two FW Barracudas and a Tiger Shark I bought off eBay years ago, and then converting them with magnetised options for counts-as Sun Sharks and Razorsharks. Oh, and finally finish off the 4 Remoras.
- A decent commander model, bigger and meaner looking than my current Crisis suits.
- Some alternate HQ choices - Ethereal and Cadre Fireblade (converted from another spare Ethereal).
- Marker Drones, Shield Drones, Missile Drones, special Pathfinder Drones.
- Finish off my Pathfinder and Fire Warrior squads...

So, here's the first thing. I bought this old Tiger Shark AX 1-0 from eBay a few years ago. It was half painted, the GS work was shocking and some of the bits (seeker missiles) were missing. It's spent the last week in a bath of Dettol with great results. I had to use a scalpel to remove all the GS work, and the primer has stained, but I think it's turned out well.

Reassembled and with Milliput covering any dodgy joins, which can then be sanded/carved smooth when dry...





Other parts. I've replaced the burst cannons with cowled ones, since I don't use the spindly ones (anyone want them??). I also widened the drone-holes in the main body with a scalpel so that the drones become swappable.



The Railguns got cut just below the barrel - the base section is glued into the model, and the barrels are magnetised. I'm going to make some Ion Cannon barrels so I can use it as a regular Tiger Shark, and some additional engine intakes/fillers for when it's pretending to be a Sun Shark.




I also finally got around to finishing off the four drones from the Ra'Lai set, which will be my Marker Drones. I'm waiting on my drill charging before I can assemble their bases.

Ooh! Good to see you back in the saddle. I take it you don't find dettol dissolved glue or made plastic rubbery them?

 inmygravenimage wrote:
Ooh! Good to see you back in the saddle. I take it you don't find dettol dissolved glue or made plastic rubbery them?

It didn't seem to do much to superglue, but it certainly softened all the green stuff that was all over it. The resin is fine, but it seems like certain parts went a bit sticky - the nose and a few bits of the underside. I can only assume that this was something do to with the paint used on those bits...

If you've been dettol stripping you might find (as I did recently) that if you get water in your dettol (if it anything less than clear) the it will strip the paint but rather than coming off loosely it will become gummy instead.

This can be resolved with another bath in dettol and/or a wash in nice hot water and a scrub wih a clean toothbrush.

This happened to my gangers on the second batch and can only have been down to water gettin into the dettol.