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Nice! The Ancient came out really good. And yes, this is how people end up with whole Chapters...and then some.

That Ancient turned out great! I'm well on the way to a whole chapter of Dark Angels myself. I've easily got a whole Battle Company, plus a good chunk of the 10th and (counting bodies in vehicles as well as bikes) basically the ENTIRE Ravenwing and half the Deathwing. It really is ludicrously easy to accumulate stuff in this hobby without realizing just how much!

So a little update.



This is on deck for the month. 3 snipers, a lictor, and a Zoe. Just put the base layer of grey seer down on the nids.

Licor I’m going to try something new. Instead of the normal purple/flesh washes, I’m going to go with a very thinned down coat and dapple some mottled spots on the carapace. Then I’m going to coat the whole guy in the white contrast paint. Probably. We’ll see how it looks with thinned paints. The idea is the same scheme as the rest of the hive fleet, but hyper desaturated as arctic camo. Face tentacles and deadly bits will be in their normal bright colors. Because real camo is boring.

Poked around the deep piles of shame for old battletech minis. I know there is more, but I could not lay hands on it. Found one med/light omnimech that never got paint, and a host of elementals, plus some metal hex bases. I'm pretty sure I’ve got some crappy plastic mechs and a few probable partial IS mechs in a box somewhere.

Have a great weekend all. Stay warm.

Looks excellent Nevelon, the banner is so eye catching.

I’m not a huge fan of the mounted skeleton look, both here and on the Indominus captain. Is what it is though. Definitely distinctive.

So finally finished building the shining spears.


They can go into the to-prime pile and await the coming of spring. Need to figure out what to build next. Leaning towards the Spartan.

Put some purple down.


Going to need to reinforce the Zoe’s base. Getting a little wobbly, even with a pin. I thinned the contrast with a lot of water. Intentionally took advantage of the tide pooling, letting it dry a little and then sopping up the extra, repeat a few times. I want to go back and do another round, maybe put some un-thinned paint into the cracks. But this is on track to the look I’m going for.

That Zoanthrope has got to be about the most top-heavy miniature of its size class. Looking forward to seeing your Shining Spears painted; I'm not particularly fond of the Craftworlds models compared to other 40k ranges, but the newer kits are nice and I do like the official color scheme for Spears.

I'm interested in how your mottling experiment works out-- the few times I've tried it, I was never satisfied with the results. Also, the Battletech bug is spreading all over Dakka, isn't it?

I haven’t thought much about the scheme on the spears. Mostly white, some blue, and the constant accents that I keep across the army. What’s what will wait until they find their way to the bench. Eldar are a bit sidelined at this point for the nid/company projects. But I want to get at least 2 units of them done this year, and the bikes might be one of those.

the wobble/top heavy issue I’m hoping will be fixed when I base it. The flock/glue mix should fill the gaps and make a more solid connection. I’ll just slap it on a little thicker then normal.

I’ve dabbled into mottling and intentionally using tide marks for my nighthaunts and more dramatically on Manfied’s cloak. We’ll see what happens here. One of my issues is that I’m a bit of a control freak about some things, and the organic nature of the process is inherently uncontrolled.

I’ve been playing the heck out of the Battletech computer game (hence the slow painting progress) so it’s real hard not to bite the bullet and go all-in on the minis version. The main things holding me back are the fact that I’d probably never actually play, and I’m not made of money to blow on random hobby projects. Of course, if I take a step back and look at the status of my life, almost nothing I paint is actually going to hit the table, so why not? But I try not to use that perspective, because it’s depressing as feth.

Anyway, progress:

Side hulls of the spartan done. Ish. Leaving the treads off for painting. Next up central hull.


Put the flesh wash on the Zoe, diluted it and put it on the spook. Noticed I missed the plate on his tail with the thinned purple. Oh well, I need to do more thin layers anyway. I think I might thin out the red to accentuate the brain bits on the Zoe. It’s the color I use for claws/guns/dangerous bits, so fits here.

Also put the first white on the snipers. They are a bit behind; need to get some progress on them.

Have a great weekend all!

Edit:
As they are on my mind, here is a collection of my classic Battletech minis from the archives”

Quick progress post.

Sparten is rolling along. Chassis basically done.

Not happy with the lictor ATM. Hopefully the black wash and another layer of carapace will help.

Zoe is looking good.

Put one more color on the snipers. Wanted to do more, no drive.

Have a good week everyone,

Looking good so far Nevelon. Only suggestion I'd have for the lictor is an orange or red brown wash on the face tentacles, try to bring them down and closer to the skin or talons a bit maybe?

Vejut wrote:
Looking good so far Nevelon. Only suggestion I'd have for the lictor is an orange or red brown wash on the face tentacles, try to bring them down and closer to the skin or talons a bit maybe?

The plan is for them to get the green wash that the tentacles on the acid maw genestealers use. So it will be toned down a bit.

The black wash will tone down the reds, the green the yellows. Still not sure it will be enough.

Looking forward to the Spartan and the Spears. Keep up the fight, Nev.

Plugging away. Still not happy with the Lictor. Maybe another pass of thinned paints will get him to a point where I’m happy.

Marines are going slow, but forward.

OK, slightly more happy. I think the base will really make him work.

Snipers are still WIP, not much progress on them.

Working on the Spartan’s sponsons. Got the bases done, and one quad LC built, Moving along.

And some progress pictures:


Hopefully I can get them done in time. Have high hopes. Also started working 2 genestealers across the bench.

In other news I’m going to take over the monthly painting comp full time starting next month. It’s a bit of work, but worth doing.

Hope everyone is having a good week.

--Nev

Hey and a big thank you for taking over the Monthly Painting Challenge!

Sincerely,,

CB

Running the challenge is a little work, but not unmanageable. Maybe 4 hours a month, with about 2/3rds of that in on big chunk making the poll thread. Helping keep that running is a little thing I can do to add to the world. I think it really does help foster a sense of healthy community, which is a good thing.

--



Got a lot of work done yesterday. Still a few details I need to do. Lenses need the gloss coat, blue needs to be inked, black wash on flex armor. Some silvers need to be picked out. And all the camo stripes. I think I’m going to pass on doing the eyes on the sarge. He’s blinking.

Stealers need both stages of eyes, tounges glossed, and reds/rocks blackwashed.

Then everyone needs to be based.

Tank construction is paused while I try to get everyone painted by the end of the month.

Hope everyone is enjoying their weekends.

--Nev

Almost there. Final touchups and basing. Plus decals for 2 of the marines.

Bugs are looking good, as are the Eliminators. I do like how you've been doing the arctic camo on the Phobos guys; makes a nice contrast with the bright blue of most of your Ultras.

I'm glad you took up the mantle of the facilitator of the monthly painting challenges. I know you'll continue to run it as well as Paradigm did and I look forward to continuing to enter (this month notwithstanding...).

Like the scouts before them, they serve a vital job of breaking up the sameness that painting marine armies brings. These guys bring me up to 2 dozen marines in arctic camo. Little over 30 scouts in woodland, halfway to the 10th company! <madness intensifies> I’ve got 2 scouts and 3 more eliminators to paint, and I think one more phobos body still on sprue. Honestly, I could probably call it at a respectable demi-co. Got the chaplain and a Lt, plus the senior sarge and a librarian to lead ~50 troops.

I’m more likely to push to a full 1st company. I’m already 2/3rd of the way there.

So a little wrap up.

Done.

And that’s a year.


I’ve already rambled on in the relevant threads, and am too lazy to copy/paste it back here right now. Pretty happy with them.



So all the nids off the workbench for the month. There is one more stealer in this lot waiting for paint. I’ve got 4 on sprue and one in the “already painted” pile that looks to be just a thin wash over primer. So I could boost this group up to a full 10 man squad if I wanted. Which would give me a full batch on the “official” bases. But I want to hold off until 10th, see if things change, of if I need to make some with certain heads, etc.

The Zoenthrope just just not have a good angle. Massive head armor makes anything from the front bad, and the back is not much better. But painted, which gives the swarm a much needed mid-sized synapse node. Still want to get more of them, and the new plastics, not this old finecast one. But i’m not going to look a gift nid in the mouth, she will serve the hivefleet well.

"I don't see anything."

That first shot with the Lictor sneaking up on the Marines is perfect. Solid year of entries, too.

Thanks. I do love the little action shot.




So some paint going down on the destroyers. Nothing fancy yet. But there will be freehand in their future for their squad logo, and probably chapter symbol to keep with the first half of the squad.

Ah, kicking it old-school for the Marine month, eh? They look good so far!

 ZergSmasher wrote:
Ah, kicking it old-school for the Marine month, eh? They look good so far!

Kicking it old school would be cleaning up some RTB01s, or dragging out some old lead terminators or space ork raiders or something like that. For an ancient grognard like me, nothing gets to be called “old school” unless it has a couple decades on it.

Not that these guys don’t have some age on them in a number of ways. They are mk III heresy marines, and a unit not active in 40k, only HH. And they are one of the oldest things in the primed pile. Both of which are reasons they are getting paint now.

Not a lot of progress since the last post. Need to keep the momentum up.

I was just a little shocked to see grey rather than blue.

 JoshInJapan wrote:
I was just a little shocked to see grey rather than blue.

Not every marine I paint is blue! OK, most of them are. Somewhere in the 3/4 to 5/6th range. I should do a head count. But I’ve got 2 different camo schemes, all of the non-line officers (ok, some of them are still blue. So more like half of them) Deathwatch, Blood Angels, Chaos!

Plus guys like these 30k destroyers, who will get another coat at some point to bring them closer to black.

Did some drybrush on them tonight. Baby steps.

Finished the build for now. Tracks will be painted separately,

Need to figure out what I want to build next. It would help if I had any clue what I wanted my 30k legion force to look like. Kind of a mish-mash of randomness now.

And get more paint down. Weekend (and month) are drifting away.

Quick update:

Put the brown wash on the gold for the marines. Need to pick up the pace.

Also put magnets in the base of 20 genestealers and the sheet in the bottom of the big box. At some point I need to figure out how I want to deal with the gargoyles. Their flight stems are magnetized, so I might be able to kit up some sort of rack for them. Might be as simple as a row of nails/screws in something with a few magnets in the bottom to fit in the box.

edit:

Musing on company organization in another thread, put this together:

Ultramarines 3rd Company (take 2, I already built them as a firstborn company)

I don’t have a nice graphic of how things are laid out. Just a sheet of paper with a bunch of circles which get crossed off and filled in as things for from built/primed/painted.

1 Captain done- alt
1 Chaplain done
1 Judicair (filling the role of company champion) done
1 Apothecary done
2 Lieutenants done
1 Ancient done
(probably 2 bodyguard vets)
(not sure if I’ll get fresh redemptor dreads, or just attach some older models to help guide the new boys, need 2-3)

Battleline:
10 intercessors, bolt rifles - front done back 5 to build
10 intercessors, bolt rifles - front 5 done, need pic, back 5 need to buy
10 intercessors, autobolt rifles - done front-back
10 intercessors, 5 bolt rifles, 5 specialists for Killteam operations - Front need pic, back built
10 intercessors, stalker bolt rifles - done -front-back
10 heavy intercessors - front done Need 5 more

Close Support:
10 assault intercessors - done 1 - 2
3 outriders - done
3 inceptors - done
3 <to be determined>

Fire Support:
10 Hellblasters - done 1 - 2
3 suppressors - done
3 eradicators - done
3 aggressors - built

I need better pis of a bunch of guys. Both as full squads, and a lot of the basic bolt rifles snuck across the paintbench without geting photographed at all

Next up to clean and build are 5 more capheracti. The first 5 from the BaC box I built as pure 2xLC, with a grenade harness on the sarge. Building these to fill out the squad and give it some options. 2 specialists with HF and Chainfists, and 3 more 2xLC guys, one with a vexila. These are not the guys to use coms or auspexes. Chainfists are there because sometimes you need to carve open the crunchy box to get to the soft bits inside. HFs are a “why not” pic. Needed something for the off-hand.



Also put magnets in the bases of the spore mines and the old stealers. Going to have to order some more 5x2mm magnets

Painting:



Getting there. Put the dark blue on the cables, leather on the holsters. Still need to greenwash the frag grenades, do up the missiles, and then the second black layer, second blue on the shoulders, ink the blue, edges, freehand symbols. Still have (roughly) half the month.

As I was clipping the terminators I mused a bit on the shape of my HH force. I think I settled on a theme and background. I was leaning heavy into a mechanized infantry force, with a lot of volkite. Mech lists seem they work well with the legion rules, and volkite just screams 30k to me.

The Calth muster was supposed to be the UM and WB teaming up against an ork empire. Volkite seems ideal for tough, lightly armored foes. Like orks. So I think I’m going to list tailor my army as if I was going on a crusade against the greenskins. Still with a healthy dash of TAC, because hello: Ultramarines.

Enough long range heavy AV to deal with things like stompas, but more focused on mid S high rate of fire to pop light vehicles like trucks. And then weight of attacks/shots to clear hordes.

It’s OK to end up with some high AV firepower, but I’m not here to cash out MEQ. Of course, a 10 man squad to 2xLC will blend marines just as well as orcs.

I’m not sure I’ll use the armored ROW, but if I do I’ll need a tank commander HQ. To that end, I just ordered a sicarian tank. The base model with the right sponsons seems like it’s just what the primarch ordered for leading a spearhead against the orks. And I’ve coveted one for a while anyway. Will kit up a extra fancy guy for the top hatch. Part of me wants to do a “drive closer! I want to hit him with my sword” pose, but that’s not a very pragmatic Ultramarine thing to do.

Anyway, cat decided she has had enough time sitting in my lap, so off to start my day. Enjoy your weekends all.