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Hi there everyone.

With the release of the Betrayal at Calth boxset, my local hobbyshop has started a pre-heresy painting competition revolving around the 20 legions, and so I have chosen the Alpha Legion. I had grown bored with painting marines in a matte fashion, and so I opted for a somewhat metallic approach by drybrushing the models with Runefang Steel and then applying two shades, Coelia Greenshade for the main armour portions, and Seraphim Sepia for the bronze areas.

Although, the stuff I have read said that the Alpha Legion, whilst primarily blue, have been known to change their colour frequently, the problem I have run into is that I'm worried that they are starting to look too much like Sons of Horus, even without the gold trim.

Is it just me, or do any of you fine people have some suggestions to nudge them more toward Alpha Legion?

I like them but if you wanted, you could add a blue wash to the deeper areas then feather it out with a damp brush?

Hmmm, yeah. Okay, i'll give that a go tomorrow, just gotta pick up a blue wash from the store. Thanks.

Personally I wouldn't muck around with them, they look bloomin brilliant! You could always keep them as is and justify it as being old skool - Alpha Legion were green in 1st edition, GW retconned them to blue in 2nd.

I think it's a fantastic take on the Alpha Legion colour scheme. Really simple, but effective. Try mixing blue and green washes slash glazes on some test models to see what kind of effects you can get - I reckon a slight tint of blue would really take these to the next level. Perhaps a thin blue glaze over the green? Hopefully you're going to keep sharing more photos as you progress, they're looking awesome.

So I went out and got some Guilliman Blue. The first image is when I applied it over the Coelia Greenshade, the second is just the Coelia as a comparison image.

Personally I still prefer the green without the blue glaze, although the blue does add a nice overall finish, but what do you guys think?

I think that there's more depth & colour variation on the 'blue' one but they're your minis so if you prefer the 2nd one go with it! It still looks ace.

So after a day or so of deliberation, i decided to go ahead with using the blue wash and i'm glad i did. I feel that they are more Alpha Legion-y, and certainly not mistakable for Sons of Horus. The lighting in my room isn't the greatest, but the model does look a teensy bit more blue than the picture might lead you to believe.

Great work! Glad you're pleased with them.

Oh yeah, the blue wash has given them the ideal green-blue colour. It's very obviously Alpha Legion, and it looks awesome! How do you plan on edge highlighting?

Thanks for the kind words!

On the subject of edge highlighting, the method that I used to get the metallic effect has ended up giving the models a slight highlight around the edges, which isn't too apparent in the images, but it is there.

Here's a close-up of the termies where the unintentional highlights are somewhat easier to see. And it's not just the light that causes them to appear.

Yeah, I can see what you mean. I personally would consider a thin highlight of silver on the sharpest of edges, but it depends on what kind of balance you're looking to strike between time spent painting and time spent gaming. If you want to pick out the rest of the details nicely and get them on the table, they'll look really impressive. Inspired stuff either way.