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migsula wrote:The Droptroop conversion is very simple, yet very successful! Looking forward to paint.

I can't take credit for that - that's Chaplain Pallantide's drop trooper, but I'm a big fan of it, too. I'm planning on using SM Scouts with shotguns or meltas with a combination of SM rebreather heads, IG Sentinel pilot heads (mostly the ones with the goggles down), and a few heads from metal IG tank commanders with the Russian-style tanker helmets. I was a huge fan of the original Elysian conversions and want to make my Drop Troops similar to those.

Update - I am pleased to announce the arrival of the latest addition to my family - Carys Munro Hawkins! (Carys - rhymes with "heiress" - Welsh for "loved")



So, when we got our first ultrasound back in the spring, they told us we were having a daughter. When we got a second ultrasound back in June, they told us we'd be having a son. When the baby was born, it turned out the first ultrasound was right - I've got myself a second daughter! Yay! It's too bad we'd been getting our two-year old ready to have a brother since June. She was excited to meet her brother Baby Ewan. That said, when I explained to her that she wasn't getting a brother, but a sister, she took it pretty well and has been excited to get to help take care of her new Baby Carys.

We'll see how long it takes to get back to the Tanith - I was just starting to do some work on the tanks, too. I'll post when I get a chance to do some more converting. In the meantime, I'm just trying to catch up on some sleep.

Congrats DBM! She's a cute little bundle. Hope you get enough sleep and a little time to yourself in between long and fun times with the wife and little ones.

Thanks, GT! It's a little slim on the time to myself outside of work these and the sleep is consistently inconsistent - one night will be good, the next will suck...although frankly that has as much to do with my 2-yr old dealing with the changes in the household.

On the subject of the army and this blog, however, I'm going to be taking a bit of a hiatus from the project, because:

1) With the new baby, even the relatively simple Tanith conversions are more labor intensive that I really want to deal with right now, so I'm looking at reconfiguring the army and just converting the Cadians with head swaps - not sure what with, though...I'm pondering a few options, one of which would be using West Wind WWII heads to make a Cadian army in simple greens reminiscent of WWII era U.S. Army - I always wanted a Kelly's Heroes army.

2) My wife has gotten a new job and so in October we will be leaving sunny Tucson and moving back to CA - probably the Gilroy/Morgan Hill area (as I allude to in this post.) Consequently, there's the house to sell, packing to do, etc...

3) Along with this, I want to see what type of gaming (if any) is in the Gilroy area - when I made the move from SF to Santa Barbara years ago, I went from a WHFB gaming group to a 40k environment and had to work up some new armies. Moving back towards the Bay Area, I know one of my old WHFB buddies is still around and wants to play WHFB, but he's only got Chaos Dwarfs and is pretty discouraged at GW's lack of support for them in 7th Ed. So, I'm not sure whether to continue on my IG 40K route, or start working up a new WHFB army. Regardless, I'm planning on picking up a few boxes of AoBR for a new marine army, so I'd have that, but if no one's playing WHFB and my buddy's not interested in playing his CDs, maybe I'll get him started in 40k and not sweat a Fantasy army. I do miss the art of maneuvering in Fantasy, though, and would enjoy getting back into it.

I'm not excited about waiting the couple months until I get back to CA to find out what the GW scene in the area is like, but I may have to grin and bear it (not like I'm playing a whole lot of 40k right now anyway, but that's another issue entirely). So, if you know of any 40k or Fantasy players around Gilroy or Morgan Hill and can put me in touch with them, I'd appreciate it.

Thanks!

I've hemmed and hawed over what type of IG army to build for the release of the new IG codex in the Spring, poring over the rumors, trying to figure out what theme would be best. After hearing "Ride of the Valkyries" the other day, I got inspired to build a Valk-mounted Catachan army (but what to do with those tanks I've collected? No ones going to want to trade new Valks for tanks! Not to mention that Valkyries don't make the Catachan plastics look any better...) So then I started looking at Pig Iron and West Wind's heads again, trying to figure out what would look good on a bunch of infantry fighting alongside a bunch of tanks (Pig Iron's Kolony Militia heads always look cool with the Cadian bodies, but lots of folks have done that - it's not the look I'm going for. So I thought about going for West Wind WWII U.S. steel helmet heads - going back to my idea for a Kelly's Heroes army. But the Cadian legs don't really fit my image for that.) Today I decided to finally open up my box of minis which had remained closed until now due to the move. And I broke out my Tanith again and started looking at them. And then I brought this thread up again and looked at the pics I had taken. And I decided, "You know what? Those models look pretty good!"

Taking a fresh look at them again, I'm now very much in agreement with others that have commented that they don't really look like they'd imagine Tanith to look. Yeah, they don't really look like Tanith. (But then, there's not anything in GW's line - including the Tanith minis - that I feel actually does.) But that's okay - after reading the last few Ghost's novels, I'm not really obsessed with making a Tanith army anymore. However, I do like the way these conversions look and so I think I'm going to continue working on the army, even if they're not going to be Tanith (frankly, they make a pretty wicked-looking Renegade army - with the dark color scheme I have planned for them, I figure I could play them as Tanith or Renegades). My plans for the tank conversions remains roughly the same, though I'm not sure about a color scheme for them yet. I'm also working on a variation of DiabloBats Elysians (seen here: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/206815.page) using Firewarrior bodies, but I plan on using IG sentinel driver heads and giving them SM Scout shotguns or converted lasguns carbines as well as loading them up with meltas and plasma guns. I figure under the new rules I should be able to use them either as Stormtroopers or as Hardened Vets.

I'm heading back east for the holidays and won't get much of a chance to work on them until the second week of January or so, but I'm getting psyched to be getting this project up and running again. Wish me luck!

cute baby.

Like the models seems so simple and looks good can't wait to see them painted

So, I don't have anything new new, but I do have some things that Dakka hasn't seen yet. These were some more troopers that I assembled before I left AZ along with the completed Bragg model and the Female trooper with a new head.

Below is the beginnings of my second squad. I didn't have anyone specifically in mind with the unhooded Tanith, but I figure I could call him Brin Milo without anyone arguing too much.



If you remember my previous photo of the female Ghost, I was really unhappy with how the head turned out. So, I replaced it with a hooded head and had the end of a braid snaking out from the side of the hood. I think it looks better. Not jump-up-and-down spectacular, but I'm happy enough with it to leave it alone.



Finally, here is my "Try Again" Bragg, hefting a lascannon. You can see in the pic from the back how the lascannon power cables run to a pack hanging from his waist. Now, #1, I'm not sure if lascannons are all that for IG in 5E, and #2, I'm not thrilled with how the model turned out, but I can't put my finger on exactly what. I know that I don't like how the cloak falls, and I think part of my dislike of the model is how I had to reposition the right arm - suggestions from readers are definitely appreciated on this, though.





I also test fit a Sentinel Driver head on a test model I did of a DiabloBats-pattern Elysian and was pretty please with the results. I think I want to file the chin on it a little (to actually give it a chin and modify the lasgun before I take any pics of it yet, though.

I'm back after a trip back east to visit family in Tennessee and South Carolina and had more time to think about my IG army while I was traveling. I had two main influences on my thought processes during this time:

- Sandy Mitchell's "Duty Calls" with Ciaphas Cain, and
- Australia, the recent Baz Luhrman movie

Duty Calls is a pretty standard Ciaphas Cain novel - Cain runs into a situation where there's an overt enemy as well as a covert menace, he regularly comments on Jurgen's smell (which at some point saves his life), etc. etc. They're fun, though. Better than a lot of the other BL authors. And frankly, the Cain novels actually get me considering making a Valhallan army. And with my love of plastic models, my first quest is, "What can I use to make Valhallans?" (because I also really dig Pig Iron's new Winter Hat heads and could use an excuse to use them). I pondered on this, thinking about different models, but lacking the internet resources to take a look at the different lines. And my conclusion is - if I want a Valhallan army, I either need to buy metal Valhallans or buy metal Pig Iron Kolony Militia. Neither of which I'm interested in doing. So, Valhallans are out - back to the Tanith.

But wait...I went to see the movie Australia with my wife, and say what you will about the movie, but the bombing of Darwin is pretty well done in it. This got me thinking (once again) about making a WWII-era-esque ANZAC IG army. I've seen it done before - some more successfully than others. But this got me thinking about my giving a go of it. My plans included making a few prototypes and then getting a lot done in resin. I was thinking of using Catachan torsos, West Wind bare heads with sculpted hats, and to represent an army that sends its men off to war in shorts, the upper legs and boots of Catachans connected by some bare knees that I planned on getting from Chaos Marauders or something like that. Again, I had no internet to speak of, so I couldn't look at the lines of models until today. None of the GW plastics really have bare knees - except for a few of the WE Glade Guard, and those won't work. I can't really sculpt my way out of a paper bag, so I'm pretty much nixing this idea as well. Again, back to the Tanith.

"What can I use to make Valhallans?" Pig Iron products and make fur on regular cadains.

keep thinking I like tanith keep it up

Yeah, I've been taking a closer look at the Pig Iron line. Here's the thing - a Kolony Militia squad of 10 runs $30 from The War Store. I think you can get it for a little cheaper from Rattlehead, but only by a buck or two - this probably washes out when you take shipping into account. Now, add to this the fact that if I were to use these as Valhallans, I'd want to get the Pig Iron Winter Headgear pack - that's ~$6.50 for 20, so another $3.25 for the unit. Add to this the fact that I'd have to do some really interesting converting for make some into heavy weapon squads (other than ML carriers, which Pig Iron does make). So, that's roughly $33.25 for a unit of 10.

What I forgot earlier, though, was that GW is still selling Valhallans! You can get a squad of 10 for $35. Which, again, if I'm going through The War Store, that means I can get a squad of 10 real, GW Valhallans for $28. That's pretty reasonable, really.

Even still, I continue to waffle on what flavor of Guard to play. I do have nearly two squads of my converted "Tanith". I just got a pack of West Wind Secrets of the Third Reich British Gas Mask Helmet heads and a pack of the German Gas Mask Helmet heads. I've got a test model I'm blue-tacking them to and hope to post some pics here shortly along with a review of the helmets.

So, in light of the new IG codex coming out, and shifting interests in armies, I'm done with the Tanith project and I'm actually looking to trade away the Tanith I've converted. If you're interested, please check out my trade thread here for my other haves and wants.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/230243.page#565823

Thanks!
DBM

first off i apologize, i know you arent supposed to resurrect dead threads, but i figured this would be the best place to put it(considering that this is the first thing that pops up on the google search for tanith first and only )
that being said i read through the novels and got enthralled with the storyline, the characters, just the ghosts in general.
I took it upon myself to try the conversions, and i managed to make about 60 ghosts, 50 of them are unpainted.
but i did paint 10 with my lackluster painting, and i was hoping that i could get a little bit of advice on how to paint the remainder
better...also i figured that somebody might want to get an amateur preview at a larger force of ghosts(eventually)

anyway, straight from my glorious fuzzy camera, some tanith mens

Wow, Ennkay! Those turned out nice! It's cool to see a complete army executed the way I had conceptualized it. At least you got paint on your Ghosts - I was never able to! While I'm usually the one to jump on someone for threadromancy, you've made a terrific contribution to this thread.

Great job!

thanks dbm, one thing i was wondering though is about the use of shadow grey on the fatigues of these guys. i could not decide on what i wanted to use to make the described "matte black", i figured leaving it chaos black would be a tad boring. Any suggestions?

These are brilliant. I want to see more!