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Ok, finished with the comp for the month.

Not happy with them, but they are done.
Full squad:


And with that, we finish up a year of the comp.

Spoilerd due to size:


While ending on a low note, I’m quite happy overall.
Lower volume than previously. Only hit the full 5 model cap 3 times, 6 entries at three, and 3 singletons. That said, two of those 3x months (Oct, Nov) were triple characters, so not just squad filler. And 2/3rds of the singletons were centerpiece models, the last being a technical challenge.
Highest ranked in the polls was the Nighthaunt, with the Killteam being my second best work. I’ll agree with that Overall I think a higher quality of work from the year before. Still a few phoned in entries, a chunk of solid table-top production work, and a nice spread of actual quality.
Diversity was way up. Huge range of subjects. Even those from the same army were different enough that the scheme was not identical.
From a new technique POV, not a lot, but a few things. Guiliman’s flaming sword was the first time I’ve actually tried to follow an online tutorial, even if I did mod it a little at the end. The Nighthaunt were a refinement of my undead spectral technique I started on Manfred the year before. Getting that set before I start cranking out more spooks (which I should get back to).

But on to year 5(!)
The last of my primed intercessor squads. Still 5 more DI to build.

Sometimes you just need to get the minis done...

Quite the spread of models in that wrap up. Again, your dedication is to be admired.

12 months and 12 entries, congratulations Nevelon.

Cheers,

CB

Thanks guys.

Just to show I’m still alive and kicking, done with the sloppy basecoats stage, next up is drybrush and washes.

Great work this year Nev, I've said it before but I really like your Nighthaunt Heros, the colours you have really work well together and the ethereal blue comes out really well.

You are very generous lending your army out, good you still get a game though

I’d really like The Boy to get more paint on his own stuff, if just so he can start fielding more of his own units. As long as he can freely use my stuff that’s one less drive to finish painting. I know one of my main motivations for getting paint on stuff is so I can get it to the table and start purging the foes of mankind. I should also really head to the local store and try to get games in there. Just no motivation to drive an hour each way on a workday to get games in at the FLGS I was frequenting.

I think I might build some more nighthaunts next. Got to make sure I’ve got a squad on deck for next October. But I also want to build more deathwatch. Decisions, decisions...

Speaking of which, some progress:


Got back to cleaning up and building the reivers. 3 cleaned and in the process of being build, 2 more just clipped. The intercessors should be done with the wash/drybrush stage. Need their second blue and a solid cleanup pass.

I’m a bit torn on the Shadowspear box. Zero interest in the chaos side. On the marine side, it’s still a lot of hit/miss. Librarian is awesome. Captain is not bad, LT is not doing anything for me. The rules on the Cpt/Lt. are pretty lame. Some simple gear swaps would help a lot, but GW’s rules are against that these days. Snipers look very nice, would grab those in a heartbeat. Not really feeling the suppressors. I saw a mock up photoshop of an intercessor with a jump pack and the autocannon arms that looked much better than the actual models. I figure I could probably kitbash some ACs out of HBs and some plastic tubes. Infiltrators are not bad. I like their rules, seem like a nice scout supplement. Models look fine.

But at that price point, is there enough to justify the box? I’d basically be picking it up for the Librarian, snipers, and the infiltrators. Even if I could find someone to split the box with, that’s a hard sell for the budget. Might actually have to break my rule about not visiting e-bay and see if I can get the bits I need for something reasonable. Or just wait/hope that full multipart kits come out and just grab those.

I’m sure full modular sets will come out soon (6months or so), so far I’ve stayed away from 40K for a few years, and even this box is not bringing me back. I’d be in for the Chaos side, but budget wise I know that’s a slippery slope and I’d be dropping hundreds down that hole.

Does your old FLGS have a list of players? If so maybe some of them are closer to you than the store and you could meet up at a house or somewhere. Just an idea.

Great progress over these last four years .

Can't justify Shadowspear, myself. Chaos isn't for me anymore, and the Marines would just be more guys in the unpainted pile. I don't work fast enough to add that many models at once. Theo is most likely correct. Wait for separate kits.

I know there are players in the area, just hard to get out of my rut, be social, and find a game. It’s an issue, largely my fault. At heart I’m an introverted hermit.

Some progress from this weekend:


Reivers built. No helmets. While they might look cool on chaplains, not a fan of the skull faced helms here. Going helmetless with make them easier to pick out of a squad of intercessors. I think the new phobos armor marines killed my desire to grab some more of these guys for my Ultras. Unless reivers get some major buffs, their narrow niche is rapidly dwindling.

Not a lot of paint, the marines are still waiting for their second blue coat.

Second blue coats down and a few more details picked out for the two WIP marines. Also built the two blind pack marines I got.

Slow progress, but it’s there.

Also picked up some more frozen tufts


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Edit:

So I have some reward points through work to burn, which can be spent for Amazon cards. Different program then before, and unlikely to be a steady stream. But I’ve been thinking about getting myself a 3d printer. A friend of mine recommended a Creality Ender 3 Pro. They run around $250, which while pricy is not out of my range. Anyone have any experience with them?

The sort of things I want to print are:
Terrain. Ruins, pipes, tanks, etc.
Shoulderpads. I’d love to be able to so some salamander ones for The Boy.
Icons. Stick to the side of tanks to liven them up a bit
Weapon options. Power axes, storm bolters, shields, etc.
Turret options. Things like a whirlwind turret, or fire prisms.

Considering the cost of filling a table with GW terrain, I could probably justify the price on that alone. I’m in no rush to pull the trigger and pick one up, but it’s on my radar. And grabbing one would open up a lot of doors. It is however a big unknown.

 Nevelon wrote:
I know there are players in the area, just hard to get out of my rut, be social, and find a game. It’s an issue, largely my fault. At heart I’m an introverted hermit.

I feel you, I'm much the same!

Regarding the 3D printer, I've heard and seen good things about Anycubic Photon (no experience with printing myself). It looks to be more expensive than the Ender 3, but I think it could work well for shoulder pads, icons and other small details. Luke Towan at Youtube uses it for his diorama details, which are pretty insane! Though I hear it stinks pretty bad..

 mcmattila wrote:

Regarding the 3D printer, I've heard and seen good things about Anycubic Photon (no experience with printing myself). It looks to be more expensive than the Ender 3, but I think it could work well for shoulder pads, icons and other small details. Luke Towan at Youtube uses it for his diorama details, which are pretty insane! Though I hear it stinks pretty bad..

From what I hear the resin based printers are probably better for mini work, but also require goopy chemicals, more cleanup and waste, smell bad, and are more expensive both to buy and run. As an entry level thing, I want to stick with a filament based printer. Thanks for the recommendation though.

Hobby update:
Put the blue wash down on the two intercessors. Next step is edges and touch-ups. Also clipped bits for 4 DW vets, 1 infernus HB, 3x frag cannons. Add some teeth to my old vet squad.


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Just need the final assembly and bases done. Put the first blue down on the last guy. One down, three to go for the DW heavies.

I'm also very much the same on not getting out and playing games - I'm happy just sitting in my cave and painting. I've been invited to a gaming session next weekend by some folks I work with which I suppose is a decent way to get jolted out of the rut.

 Nevelon wrote:

 mcmattila wrote:

Regarding the 3D printer, I've heard and seen good things about Anycubic Photon (no experience with printing myself). It looks to be more expensive than the Ender 3, but I think it could work well for shoulder pads, icons and other small details. Luke Towan at Youtube uses it for his diorama details, which are pretty insane! Though I hear it stinks pretty bad..

From what I hear the resin based printers are probably better for mini work, but also require goopy chemicals, more cleanup and waste, smell bad, and are more expensive both to buy and run. As an entry level thing, I want to stick with a filament based printer. Thanks for the recommendation though.

I agree with this too. I just bought myself a 3d printer this weekend, and even though I know resin printers like the Photon will produce the best results for miniatures and mini components, I didn't want to jump into vats of resin for my first printer. I picked up the Anycubic i3 Mega since it got very good reviews, there was an offer on and I also figured that if I had a good experience with the brand it would give me more confidence in buying the Photon. So far I've only run a few test prints with the reel of PLA that came in the box, and I've been impressed. The assembly was minimal, pretty much just plug and play, and it's a sturdy well built machine. Just took a couple of minutes adjusting and levelling the bed, then started printing the test file. It worked fine first time, and since then I've printed a few small terrain bits I found on Thingiverse - a stack of barrels which I've printed in a couple of different layer heights just to get a feel for how the different layer heights come out in an actual print, and a set of walls so I can try out different post-processing methods.

I was trying to decide for a while whether to take the plunge or not, because I had the idea in my head that it would be a pain to set up, calibrate and troubleshoot, but I've not had any issues so far. No doubt some will arise in time, but it's been a good first few days.

---

On the minis, yeah I'm not really into the skull faced helms on the Reivers. Problem is, I like all my models to wear helmets! If I ever build any I may have to substitute helmets from other kits.

I always like seeing some Deathwatch.

The more I think about printers the more things I think I could do with it. Getting very tempted. Latest idea was to print bits to turn a spare farseer into a spritseer. Just need to really print up a staff head, although the back thing would be good as well.

Painting progress:

Almost done with the basecoats (and did the drybrush already) just need the red down. Other guys still waiting for decals and base work.

Good progress on the range of models you've got going. I'm tempted my Shadowspear myself for the Chaos stuff but the phobos pattern armour just doesn't do it for me outside of the snipers.

Nevelon,

Your painting challenge marines are looking good, I have stalled on mine.

Cheers,

CB

Tyranid Horde wrote:Good progress on the range of models you've got going. I'm tempted my Shadowspear myself for the Chaos stuff but the phobos pattern armour just doesn't do it for me outside of the snipers.

The thing that gets me, is that if I wait for kits to be available, a) they might never come out, and b) they’ll probably charge $30 for that librarian, and I refuse to pay that price for a single character model. But nothing in the box strikes me as a must-have tactically, so I’ll wait and take my chances.

Captain Brown wrote:Nevelon,

Your painting challenge marines are looking good, I have stalled on mine.

Cheers,

CB

We still have half a third of the month left, plenty of time! (I need to pick up the pace a bit, where did the month go!)

No pic, but I just put the last wash down on my remaining marine. Next step is the second blue, then the blue wash. After that, final touch ups, decals and bases.

Just put the last blue coat down. Wash later. Want to get this guy done this weekend. I should get back to cleaning mold lines.

Going to be a rough weekend here, hope you all have a good one.


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Blue wash down. Next: clean up and edges

Edit2:
Cleaned and edged. Still need to glue his arms on and tidy up the base, then decals and flock.

Good morning all.

Ready for the decals, then the flock. Plugging away at the DW heavies. The feel a little same-y, I might have the hits the bits box for a few extras to liven them up a bit. Models are already a bit busy, so might be rough to find a spot for something custom.

I had not noticed you had put a sword on the one chap. It looks quite cool.

 youwashock wrote:
I had not noticed you had put a sword on the one chap. It looks quite cool.

For 4 points on a 3A model, how could I not?

Of the 4 intersessor sergeants I’ve built so far, all have swords. The 2 Ultras from the DI set have simple hand swaps from the old ravenwing accessory sprue, One of the DW has an VV relic blade, and the other DW has a whole arm from a tarterous terminator. The last DI sarge I have (still on sprue) will probably get a powerfist.

I’m quite fonds of how all of them turned out. I’ll be sure to get them together for a group shot once this one is done.

Speaking of which, finished decals and glued down tufts and rocks. Next step is to smear some flock around, but I need to allow plenty of time for the rocks to set. Might be this evening; we’ll see.

They're all looking good Nev. I like the sword thing too. Nice touch.

Thanks.

Build done while I’m waiting for the glue to dry:


Listen up you primitive xenos, this is my boom-stick!

Special ammo can do a lot of things. But sometimes you need something with a little more kick. Enter these guys. 3 frag cannons for either cracking open tanks, or templates of doom, and one HB/HF for use in MW shenanigans. And purging. I hope when they re-do the SoB they give them infernus HBs. Seems the sort of thing that would turn them on.

Need to figure out what to build next. I should probably scrape some mold lines off some Nighthaunts to get them ready for October, but no real rush for that. Always more Eldar, Ultras, and Deathwatch that need some love as well. Thoughts?


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Still need to smooth and work on the joins, but that needs to happen after the glue has completely set.

But here is what will be my top voted entry in this year’s comp (judging from prior Death entries) some spooks:



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Same base sarge as the guy I just painted. But instead of a hand swap for a sword, he got a whole new powerfist arm and a head swap.

Nice! I really like this sergeant. I might need to copy him

 Nevelon wrote:
Listen up you primitive xenos, this is my boom-stick!

Well Bruce Campbell is a fan of 40K.

Cheers,

CB

Those guys are going to bring a lot of heat. New sarge looks quite cool, too.

As always, enviable progress... very much looking forward to watching DW come together!

Thanks guys.

The sarge was a little tricky to put together. One was finding a nice fist. That one is from the Mk. IV tacs in the BaC box. Seemed a bit more in scale for primaris. The next was posing. The helmet on his hip gets in the way of a lot of angles. I could have the fist with forward, up, or back. With the gun pose and motion of the figure, back seemed best. I probably could have adjusted the gun; he probably could have worked well with a gun pointing up, fist forward pose. Real easy to mod this sage though, as his arms and shoulders are separate from the torso, so it’s just a mater of finding suitable replacements.

DW are going to get a lot of punch once the rattlecan comes out. Heavy weapons, aggressors, and the dread. Plus some reivers and an inceptor. And that’s just the build stuff.

But next in the build queue is the second War Walker. I figured I’m going to want to field them as a pair, might as well get him built. Started clipping and glueing.

Finished with those 3. That brings my second Ultra squad up to a fieldable 5 man. I took a squad pic, but my photo program decided to choke somewhere in the download after telling the camera to erase them. I’ll grab some pics of all of them together sometime.

Speaking of the powerfist sarge above, here are his peers:

My favorite remains the Ultra with his sword out to the side. I think Sgt. Zepher, the White Scar takes second. Sgt. Solaris, the Novamarine takes third, with the new guy bringing up the rear. But I don’t dislike anyone; I think they are all solid works. Assuming I don’t screw up too bad, I think the powerfist sarge might be able to take second place. If I really knock him out of the park, he could upset my favorite. But that will take some work.

Nevlon,

Another fine entry for the monthly painting competition.

Cheers,

CB