ZergSmasher's P&M Blog: PLASTIC SISTERS, Dark Angels, and Blackstone Fortress

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**youwashock**

Suit is looking good. I like the yellow as a counter to the dark blue. It is just the right amount of contrast, I think. Speaking of, have fun playing with the Contrast paints.

**ZergSmasher**

@YWS: Thanks! I've been pretty happy with the blue and yellow combination on my Tau stuff so far.

I finished the big stealthy guy. Here are my final pics of him:

I'm very happy with how the model turned out. The darker color scheme (compared with the majority of my Tau forces) helps denote it as a stealth unit while still tying in visually with the rest of the army. The main gun is magnetized, hence why different photos show the two different options (Fusion Collider and Cyclic Ion Raker). I didn't make the secondary weapons swappable unfortunately, but then I would rarely run anything other than the Fusion Blasters on this thing. Feel free to vote for these images in the Dakka Gallery.

This morning, since I had the day off work, I decided to try out the Contrast paints for the first time. The test subjects: a Deathwing Terminator Squad from Dark Vengeance, slightly modified (the Assault Cannon guy has a Cyclone Launcher and Storm Bolter instead of the cannon). Here's a photo showing the three different Contrast colors I used:

The colors are Skeleton Horde for the armor, Dark Angels Green for the sergeant's tabard and the chest eagles, and Black Templar for the armor joints and wing details. The paint is really good, providing good shading and even some highlights, but unfortunately I think Skeleton Horde has made the armor too dark. I don't think there's a different contrast color that would do any better for Deathwing armor though, so I'm not sure what to do. Maybe I'll go over the armor with Ushabti Bone, leaving the darker color still showing in the recesses [/duncanrhodes]. Even if I end up having to do this, I still saved some serious time, as I would have to have laid down 2 thin coats of Zandri Dust and an all over shade of Agrax Earthshade to do the same job as one coat of Skeleton Horde. These contrast paints are the real deal! I will be doing all the other details, like the weapons and stuff, with traditional paints. I'm probably going to try contrast on a Dark Angels Tactical Squad soon, so we'll see how well Dark Angels Green works on the power armor of its namesake Chapter.

**youwashock**

That suit rules. Just an all around awesome piece. The Deathwing are shaping up nicely, as well. Interested in seeing how you develop the main color. Cool that you swapped the AC for a Cyclone. Wouldn't mind a better look at that conversion.

**Theophony**

Big stealthy guy looks great

, I haven’t kept up with 40K in a long time, but Tau are just looking better all the time and I think it’s because of paint schemes like yours and Nerdfest09’s

**IGtR=**

Ghostkeel does look good - always makes me think the Tau less goofy than usual and more spec ops/futureish

**Bellerophon**

That Ghostkeel is looking really effective. I love that shade of blue and yellow together (it's not a million miles away from a scheme I used on some Swooping Hawks recently). Keep it up!

**ZergSmasher**

@YWS: Thanks! It may be a little while before I get back to the Deathwing, as that was mainly just a test of the new Contrast paints and I have other more important stuff to paint up first. As for the CML conversion, it's pretty simple. I just took the AC model from Dark Vengeance, replaced the AC arm with a Storm Bolter and shoulder pad from the actual Deathwing Terminator Squad kit, and put a CML from the same kit on top. It fits the monopose Termies just like any other. Simple as can be.

@Theo: Thanks! I've been really happy with my scheme and have gotten many compliments on it, so I must have done something right. The newer Tau models are just amazing too. I fell in love with them when they came out and I think I've probably painted some of all of them now, except for the new Crisis suits (which I do have, just not painted yet) and the Tidewall terrain.

@IGtR=: Thanks! The futuristic look is what first got me interested in Tau. It's very different from the chunky industrial look of Imperial models for sure.

@Bell: Thanks!

Sorry for the late reply, but I have been getting some hobbying done. The main thing has been this quick and dirty painted Stealth Team:

They aren't as well done as my Ghostkeel, but I didn't spend that long on them either. I just wanted to get them done up real fast while I had the right paints in my "ready rack" on my desk. I'll need them for my comp list, so now I don't have to worry about doing them. The antennas broke off a while back and I don't have any replacements, hence why the Burst guys don't have them.

My next major project, and my entry for the July monthly painting challenge, will be a unit of Wulfen for my Space Wolves. These will be a tough challenge, as the models are very detailed and some of that detail is tricky to get to and pick out. Look forward to WIP shots of them in the days ahead.

**youwashock**

Quick, but effective. Sometimes it is nice to just get some guys done. Will we be getting an army shot of the Tau any time soon?

**ZergSmasher**

@YWS: Totally agree; with regular models it's nice to just get them battle ready. When we get closer to that GT next month and I've gotten my whole force ready for it, I will post an army shot.

Making progress on my Wulfen. Not a whole lot to show yet, but here's a WIP shot anyway:

I've only painted the skin, black carapace, and gray armor. Next will be the gold details, of which there are plenty. It won't be quite as bad as doing a whole squad of Chaos Space Marines with all their trim, but there's still plenty of stuff to pick out.

**ZergSmasher**

More progress on the Wulfen:

They're definitely coming together. Most of the major colors are done, so it's smaller details that need to be picked out yet. The only major parts left are the silver metallics and the weapon handles. The Great Frost Axes will be interesting, as they need to have a fairly unique look. Fortunately there are plenty of cool tutorials for making them look, well, frosty. More to come!

**ZergSmasher**

Making yet more progress on my Wulfen:

They are almost done. The only major detail left is the frost weapon blades (claws and axes), but there are a few smaller things, like the gems, shoulder pad symbols, maybe a couple of talismans that I missed, plus some cleanup where I got a little sloppy with the paint.

In other news, I will be going to a 40k tournament next weekend, and since it will be more of a hobby-related tournament (as opposed to super competitive) I'll go ahead and give the Dark Angels one last hurrah. The list rules are 2 detachments max and no repeat detachments (so no double Battalion), so I'll be running a Battalion made up purely of Primaris Dark Angels, and an Outrider of Ravenwing. This will best showcase my hobbying progress over the last couple of years. To that end, I'm actually painting a third 5-man Intercessor squad, as well as the special Dark Angels Primaris Lieutenant and the 30th anniversary Veteran Intercessor Sergeant. Here are some WIP shots of them:

Did all of that painting this afternoon mostly, a little this evening as well. It helps me to have something playing in the background; in this case it was some episodes of Stargate SG-1. Hopefully I can get these DA finished in time for the weekend, and get more progress in on my Wulfen. More to come on these!

**Theophony**

Wulfen are looking great, so I should the progress on the intercessors

**JoshInJapan**

but there are a few smaller things, like the gems, shoulder pad symbols, maybe a couple of talismans that I missed

Isn't that the worst? Thew wulfen look good so far--I look forward to the finished models.

**ZergSmasher**

@Theo: Thanks!

@Josh: Yeah, it's frustrating finding little details that I missed and having to pick them out at the last minute. Happened a couple of times on these guys.

Finally finished the Wulfen, and not a moment too soon. Here are the final pics:

I'm pretty happy with how I did on these overall. I feel like the part I did best on was the frost weapons; they really came out exactly how I wanted them. The worst bit is the faces though; I didn't thin my skin tones enough and clogged a lot of the little detail on them, hence why they look kind of bland and lumpy. At least the hair looks okay and should distract from the facial failure a bit.

The Dark Angels guys are basically done; I'll throw up some finished pics in a day or two. I just mainly need to do a few touchups. In addition to the final pics of them, I'll post a group photo of my list from this past Saturday's tournament, showcasing the fully painted Dark Angels force I ran in that event.

Next month, my entry is going to be an Imperial Knight if I can get a window in the weather to prime it soon. If I don't, I'll probably do a unit of Tau Crisis Battlesuits. If I do the Knight, it'll be in my other blog.

**youwashock**

The frost weapons did turn out awesome. Looking forward to that DA army pic and hopefully a Knight.

**ZergSmasher**

@YWS: Thanks!

As promised, here comes a fairly big photo dump. I finished some more reinforcements for my Sons of the Lion, so now I can show them to you all.

Firstly, here is an Intercessor Squad:

Nothing amazing here, just a tabletop standard squad. I painted them as 6th Company, as I figure Dark Angels would relegate a lot of their Primaris forces to the reserve companies due to their trust issues (hiding the whole Fallen thing and all). The models are a set of the ETB Intercessors, with one extra guy from a second set of them and the mini from the Getting Started with Warhammer 40,000 magazine (who is the same sculpt as one of the ETB guys but with a fancier base).

Next, here is the 30th Anniversary Veteran Intercessor Sergeant:

I got this model for free at Adepticon 2018, so he's been sitting around for a while. Nice to finally get him painted. The model is nice, but not really anything special (and not worth the inflated price tag). Sort of disappointing for a 30th anniversary thing, but I had fun painting him anyway. I use him if I want to equip one of my Intercessor squads with a Power Sword, as he has one sheathed behind him.

Lastly, here is the special Dark Angels Primaris Lieutenant, Zakariah:

I'm really happy with how this model turned out. He was loads of fun to paint, too, and is one of my favorite Dark Angels-specific models of all time.

As I said in my previous post, I played in a small local tournament recently. The event was more hobby-focused rather than super-competitive, so I decided to gather some of my best-painted Dark Angels and put them on the field. Since I haven't done any army photos in here for a while, here are some beauty shots of the army I ran in that event.
First, a shot of the whole army:

The force consists of a Battalion Detachment of Primaris Marines and an Outrider Detachment of Ravenwing.

Here's a shot focusing on the Primaris guys:

And one of the Ravenwing:

Sorry if the photos are slightly blurry. I'm pretty proud of how this army looked, although there were at least a couple of others at the event that put these guys to shame. Still, it was cool to see all the nicely painted stuff on the table, both mine and everyone else's.

For next month's painting challenge, I will not be entering the Knight, but rather the Tau Crisis suits. This is for a number of reasons, first of which is that I'll need one of the suits to run as an XV8 Commander in a list I'm taking to a GT next weekend. I'll probably still start the Knight at some point this month, but now I won't have to hurry with it and prime it in less-than-ideal weather conditions (the humidity here in central Missouri is downright stifling currently).

**youwashock**

Yup. That's awesome. A force to be proud of. The DAPLt is a very cool model. Sort of like Cypher lite. Great work.

**ZergSmasher**

@YWS: Thank you! I really like all of the Chapter-specific Lieutenants. They all capture the visual feel of their respective Chapters. Had a blast doing the Space Wolves one last year.

Very much switching gears yet again. I've begun working on my Crisis suits. Here's where they are at so far:

That's basically all of the basecoats down, so shading and highlighting will be next, as well as touching up the black where I slopped a bit of the paint around.

I'm also working on my walking Ethereal for my GT list:

Sorry for the blurry photo.

I actually started on this guy last year, but never got around to finishing him. Since I'm not running my Ethereal on a Hover Drone this time around, I now have need of this model. I really like the look of the different Ethereal models, and I do intend to eventually track down all the old OOP ones as well.

More to come on these guys soon!

**youwashock**

Still a fan of that blue and yellow scheme. More cool robots is never a bad thing.

**ZergSmasher**

@YWS: Thanks, I've really been happy that the scheme has worked as well as it has. I don't see anyone else's Tau looking very similar, so if anyone else is doing one, I've never seen it.

Another image dump today. I finished painting that Ethereal, so here are the final pics of him:

He turned out okay, but not amazing or anything. Still, I'm pretty happy and he'll look good among the rest of my forces. The handles on his scepter thingies are blue to tie him in with the rest of the army.

I also painted a display board for when I take my Tau army to tournaments:

Nothing too fancy, but it is all freehand. I did the text in the T'au language (referencing Codex: T'au Empire). The top reads, "T'au Empire" and the bottom reads "For The Greater Good".

Finally, as I said earlier I'll be running my Tau army in a tournament over the weekend. The event is Siegeworld 2019 in St. Louis, Missouri. Here's a shot of the army I'll be running:

That's 30 Fire Warriors, 20 Shield Drones, 3 Riptides, 3 Commanders, some characters, and a Ghostkeel. I'm not really a good enough player to expect to win the whole thing, but I hope to do reasonably well.

As for the Crisis Suits I'm doing for the monthly painting challenge, the leader is being used as one of my three Commanders, and so is further along paintwise than the other two. I wanted him to look good for the event. He still needs some touchups, but he's basically done, so after the event I'll mainly be working on his buddies.

**youwashock**

Look at that pile of greater-mecha-goodness. Pretty awesome. Good luck at the event!

**JoshInJapan**

That's a nice army. The blue-and-yellow combination is quite striking.

I haven't played Tau since 4thEd, and even then only once or twice. Twelve shield drones seems like a lot-- are they stronger now than they were way back then?

**ZergSmasher**

@YWS: Thanks!

@Josh: Thanks! Shield drones are a necessity if you want to run the big suits these days, as Riptides are not that hard to kill without the ability to pass wounds off to drones.

Sorry for no updates, but I have made some progress. My Crisis suits are very nearly done:

Only some very small touchups and minor details left on the suits themselves, and then I need to get the weapons finished. I also need to finish the bases. The suits are fully magnetized, but for the painting challenge I'll be using these weapons to show off a bit of the range of weapons available to Crisis suits. The Cyclic Ion Blasters are actually 3rd party bits, with a single and double on the arms (so 3 weapons total). The company that makes them is called Red Dog Minis, and I'd post a link but their website is down currently. I love the way they look, so I'm glad I ordered a whole bunch of them to arm some Crisis suits.

I hope to have final pics of these guys soon.

**ZergSmasher**

I finally finished the Crisis suits. Took longer than I'd hoped, too. Here are the final pics, at any rate:

They are not my best work by a long shot, but they'll fit in nicely with the rest of my army. Of course, I have yet to field a unit of Crisis suits in 8th edition 40k (other than one casual game), so they'll probably do shelf duty for the most part, but it's still nice to reduce the pile of shame a little bit. Feel free to vote for these in the Dakka Gallery.

After having played a few games with my Tau including in that GT recently, I've finally realized that I need to add Commander Shadowsun to my army. Neither of my local shops have her model in stock, so I decided to just get a Stealth suit set and kitbash my own. This is the result:

Yeah, it's kind of janky looking, but it looked a lot better in my head when I planned the conversion. Once I get it painted I'm sure it'll look better. Not sure what the time frame on that will be, as I've got a lot of other stuff to paint to get ready for a GT in November.

After seeing the Warhammer Community previews from the NOVA Open, I'm giving very serious thought to starting a Sisters of Battle army when those models drop. I know I need another army like I need a hole in my head, but those models they previewed are simply too cool! To finance the venture, as I'm still paying for dental stuff, I'll probably have to sell most if not all of my Chaos collection, including my Chaos Marines, Death Guard, and Daemons. Honestly I really should just do it, as I never play Chaos anymore and the models are just sitting there collecting dust. We'll see how I feel about it once the release date gets closer.

**youwashock**

I do like those suits. Your Shadowsun is neat. I would be curious to see how it looks from a different angle. I am liking the Sisters previews for the most part. I won't be getting an army, but I would like to pick up a squad or so for the shelf.

**ZergSmasher**

@YWS: Thanks!

Started working on my Suppressors for the monthly painting challenge, so here's how they are shaping up so far:

Plenty of work left to do, and I haven't touched the bases yet other than to put the annoying flight stems and the little scenic bits that come with the box set on them.

Speaking of the annoying flight stems, I actually learned a neat little trick when I did my last batch of Inceptors. The Citadel Assembly Painting Handle (the one with the little arms) can actually be used to hold a model in place while the glue dries if you do it right. Made it a little easier to get the Inceptors to stay on their stems, so I'm hoping it'll work well for these Suppressors.

**youwashock**

Man, I love those guns. They're like an updated version of the old 2nd/3rd ed Chaos Havocs. They are looking good in your DA colors.

**ZergSmasher**

@YWS: Yeah, I like the guns too. It's a pity the unit isn't really that good on the tabletop, so these may not see much play.

Still painting, but not too much progress of late. Grandfather Nurgle decided to bless me last week (perhaps hinting that I should be painting Death Guard), so I didn't do too much, but I have made progress on my Suppressors since my last post:

Not much left to do. Just some highlights on the red casings, a couple of minor details to pick out, and I need to clean up the green armor a little bit. The bases are coming along (no photos today, sorry), so I should have these guys done by the end of the month as planned.

I also ordered some stuff online relatively recently and had it come in the mail the other day. One thing was a set of minis for Warlord Games' Bolt Action, the characters from the classic TV series M*A*S*H. No photos yet as I'm not yet working on them, but they will be done by Christmas as a gift for my brother who loves that show.

The other thing I ordered was an eBay find. Wargames Exclusive's Greater Good Dash Commander, a counts-as Shadowsun that I call the "fantasy waifu" version:

That wacky conversion I did before ended up not being necessary now that I've found this. I saw the model and I just had to have it! I'll probably paint both versions since this new model is a bit smaller than the official Shadowsun and so might be considered to be modelling for advantage at some tournaments (probably not, but...eh).

Next month's painting challenge is going to be Halloween-themed as usual, so I'll have to see what I've got that fits the bill. I've got various Nurgle Daemons that need paint, the Chaos Beastmen from Blackstone Fortress, some LOTR stuff that could be scary (giant spiders, a Troll or two, various Orcs), so I've got choices. Leaning towards Blightlord Terminators, but those might be tough to fit in while I'm painting stuff for other projects.

**Yorkright**

Zerg you have been cranking out the armies! Love the yellow and blue tau and the DA are looking spot on. Hope your feeling better soon.

**youwashock**

I look forward to seeing how "Shadowsun" turns out. She does look a little light on armor, but is a great figure. Cool models over rules any day.