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I've decided to put together a painting blog to both record my progress with my latest projects, while giving myself the motivation to keep working on them. I hope to make weekly posts with substantial progress on these armies.

I intend to write an armylist, play it often, flesh out the list with models, and then set it aside once I'm done. My hope is that approaching my projects as framed, finite entities will help me remain inspired to complete them.

Without further ado, my Alpha Legion: a loyalist Horus Heresy army.

Some context... This army will double as a Horus Heresy proper army, and in games of 40k as a Deathwatch army. I feel that the Deathwatch represent the Alpha Legion fairly well and several people I play with regularly dislike playing against or with Horus Heresy armies. I love the look of frag cannons but have absolutely no interest in buying 4 kill teams just to get 4 of them. So I converted my own. In 30k they simply count as missile launchers with suspensor webs. Can you guess which veteran trait is my favorite?

Cool idea for the frag cannon /ML .

Also a nice idea using DW for the models to use in 40k.

Looking forward to seeing more of this.

EDC

Nice start! Subbed!

The beginnings of a certain Harrowmaster. I'm waiting on a few parts before completion.

Nice start, where'd the fancy hammer head come from?

EDC

The hammer is from the Longbeards kit from WHFB. Gorgeous treasure trove of space-marine sized weapons.

Paint is put to plastic! Primed black and base coated with GW's grey spray paint.



I've also set myself a challenge... On Saturday, I have a game with an Imperial Fists player with my Black Legion. His army is notorious for always being fully painted to a fantastic degree, so to combat this advantage, I have decided to take matters into my own hands by painting 15 Chaos Terminators (the astute among you will recognize the number conveniently being the amount of terminators needed for a Terminator Annihilation force).



FOR THE WARMASTER!

This is shaping up to be an interesting project! That harrowmaster is lookin' good already!

I come with sad news. The game had to be rescheduled because my COWARDLY Sorry, I mean busy opponent had to be out of town this weekend. As a result, I've taken the time to lavish my terminators with slightly more attention and thus they are not complete. However much progress has been done. Behold!






But worry not, the Black Legion will march to war either Monday or Tuesday against the Space Wolves of Fenris.

Good to hear you'll still get a game in. Interesting Termies there, is there a reason behind the cataphractii in the squad?

Yes! To provide some context, I have 3 painted terminators who are meant to be a termicide squad. Them and 12 of the terminators here will make up the TAF. The Cata terminators will represent the Bringers of Despair with Mark of Tzeentch.

Nice work on the termies. They're looking really great.

Hopefully now you've had extra time to lavishly paint them they'll perform better on the tabletop. (although my experience with freshly painted units is that they die horribly in their first game without achieving anything)

EDC

To their credit, their first game is a hard one to beat. The deep strike round of shooting from the formation wiped out a unit of Longfangs, especially the Sorcerer Lord with the Brand of Skal. Then the sorcerer cast Death Hex on a squad of 10 Wulfen. The Bringers of Despair and a squad of terminators wiped out 6 wulfen, as well as Logan Grimnar who was in the squad in a single round of shooting.

Well, brothers and sisters, I must unfortunately report that tonight's game also had to be canceled. Not due to my foe this time, but due to my own illness. It seems that SOMEBODY didn't read the ritual to supplicate the Gods of Chaos correctly. I assure you the underling has been appropriately dealt with.

The free time and resulting sick day has allowed me to essentially finish my terminators. There's a few small details I need to touch up on the Chaos Wolf Lord and their bases, but aside from that they are finished.
I apologize for how blurry the pictures are, I will have access to my wife's much fancier camera this weekend and with it I hope better pictures will result.

First up, the Justaerin/ Bringers of Despair:





Second I bring you a classic unit of Chaos Terminators, lead by a Terminator Champion who had a mutation make his right arm unusable. So he chopped it off and had a gun mounted in its place! Take that, Tzeentch. Tentacles are gross.



Finally the benefactors of a particularly recent and fruitful supply raid. Bet these guys were dancing all the way back to the Eye of Terror when they found five suits of terminator armor unattended! This is how I imagine a lot of the more fanciful architecture on Chaos Space Marine armor takes place. The original owner simply paints it on, and after a while the power of the warp changes and twists the armor into an image of its owner. Paint turns to reality, hatred turns to tusks and horns, bestial wrath turns to snarling teeth and faces.




And at long last, the small group of terminators that were previously just a termicide squad bolstered to full numbers. I somehow managed to lose a full terminator along the way over the last few years, and so for the time being the Chaos Wolf Lord will be their unit champion. Him and the chap with a heavy flamer are the noobies, but I don't think the three other guys will say anything about it... The army was originally NMM gold, but I've decided to move on to a more practical method of painting them.





And there you have it! I hope by this weekend to have them based and ready to take to the field of battle.

A little slow going, but we're back! The Terminators are fully based and the Black Legion marches to war against the might of the Imperial Fists in a truly close game. Some photos...



My opponent's first turn, a horrendous shooting army that took a grim toll on my poor Maelstrom of Gore and Chaos Spawn. By the end of the first turn, I had only these models left alive...



But all is not lost! Abaddon the Despoiler cometh!



And see his wrath unleashed...



The game was a very hard-fought draw, 10 to 10 victory points (we played Maelstrom mission 1). He ended up wiping most of my army because of how close he deployed to the edge I just couldn't get enough terminators in the right places. My horrendous rolls didn't help... the migthy Abaddon was felled by bolter fire.

Ah, failbaddon back at it again, i see.

A very interesting battle it seems, i'm surprised at how many VP you got despite almost being tabled. Well Done!

Thank you! It definitely looked very bleak, but he suffered many casualties. Abaddon's Legions are endless, every dead Fist is one less gun on the walls of Terra.

Nice poses, subscribed

Alright, a tournament is coming up, ITC rules, and I have prepared an armylist to guide my modelling projects.

1850

Tip of the Spear

Hounds of Abaddon
Chaos Lord (Juggernaut, Power Fist, Lightning Claw, Dark sigil)

Chaos Marines x5

Khorne Berzerkers x5

Bikers x3

Terminator Annihilation Force

Sorcerer Lord (Mastery 3, Burning Brand of Skalthrax, Spell Familiar)

Terminators x5 (Mark of Tzeentch, Power Fist x4, Chainfist, Combi-plasma x5)

Terminators x3 (Combi Plasma x3, Axe x3)

Terminators x5 (Combi-plasma x5,Single Lightning Claw x2, Powerfist, Maul x2)

Allied Detachment (Chaos Space Marines)

Ahriman (Disc of Tzeentch)

Cultists x10

Chaos Rapier Battery x3 (Laser Destroyer)

1850

The terminators are already painted (as you've all seen), the sorcerer is already painted, the Chaos Marines are painted, the Berzerkers are painted.

Cool list. So what will you be painting next?

EDC

Apologies for the absence. On my painting table right now is Ahriman, Supreme Sorcerer of the Thousand Sons. I'm super excited to paint this model.

Alright, after many test games and a stressful schedule, I have finally decided upon my ultimate list. Tragically I did so after almost completing Ahriman, and he didn't make the cut. My painting progress has slowed while I work to ensure my army's properly WYSIWYG. Pictures coming this afternoon. Only thing missing are a trio of bikers that should be arriving on Friday.

Check with your TO where they stand on inter-Legion Allies. RAW CSM Warlords cannot take an Allied Detachment of CSM, regardless of what Legions they are :(

Oh, sweet, thanks for the heads up, I didn't even consider that. Ironically I just changed my list to include a Crimson Slaughter allied detachment instead of a non-Aligned one. I'll post my updates list tonight, too


Automatically Appended Next Post:
First, lets start with the finalized armylist.

Tip of the Spear Detachment

Command
Sorcerer Lord
Level 3, Jump Pack, Spell Familiar

Core
Hounds of Abaddon
Chaos Lord
Sigil of Corruption, Juggernaut, Power Fist, Lightning Claw, Combi-Melta

Chaos Space Marines x5
Bolters x5, Bolt Pistols x5

Khorne Berzerkers x5

Chaos bikers x3


Auxiliary
Chaos Sorcerer
Force Axe, Burning Brand of Skalthrax, level 3, Spell Familiar

Terminator Annihilation Force
Chaos Terminators x5
Mark of Tzeentch, Combi-plasma x5, Chain-fist, Powerfist x4

Chaos Terminators x5
Combi-plasma x4, Heavy Flamer, Power Fist, Lightning Claw, Power Axe x3

Chaos Terminators x3
Combi-plasma x3, power axe x2, power maul

Allied Detachment (Crimson Slaughter)
Sorcerer
Level 3 Mastery, Balestar of Mannon, Jump Pack

Cultists x10

Helldrake
Baleflamer

Rapier Weapons Battery x3
Hades Autocannon x3

Now the army...



A note: the helldrake's base is currently drying from basing materials, so mounting it was not possible. It does have one, though!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Next up some close-ups.

The Khorne Lord on Juggernaut:




The Khorne Lord's name will be the White Knight, a supposedly honorable and chivalrous warrior. His color scheme will reflect that.

The Rapier Battery:





I decided that rather than try to fit the honestly ridiculously over-sized Hades autocannon from the Forgefiend kit to a Rapier kit, I instead decided to use the scale from the Helldrake's Hades autocannon.

Sorry for the absence, folks, but a wide variety of matters in the Warp required my attentions. But I return with a healthy dose of progress! For the Warmaster!



The base of my Helldrake, painted to appear as if an ancient chaos emblem has been buried by fallen debris.






The White Knight, Banefist, riding to war on his juggernaut. I wanted this guy to really stand out against the black and gold legions of the army but still fit in.




A Night Lord sorcerer lord who has thrown his lot in with Abaddon the Despoiler. Even his wing mutation takes the shape of the Night Lords emblem, a winged skull.





Finally a sorcerer lord from my homebrew renegade warband, the Ghosts of Spharda. Some of you will recognize the ash-grey armor, red swirl and golden armlet as being memorable of a certain Spartan warrior who aspired to be the God of War.

Brilliant update, and the scheme on these axes is very nicely executed.

Keep it up !

Great work. Banefist really stands out on his own there, and I'm sure will really stand out amongst the berserkers. Very cool work on the sorcerer as well!

This is some pretty cool stuff here Krayt! I really like the Sphardan sorceror, the armor is magnificent!

Thank you all for the kind words! I appreciate it. I have a full squad of the Ghosts of Spharda ready to wage war, I'll toss up a photo of them shortly, Justaerin.

Thanks, Azazelx, I'm definitely eager to take a group shot with him to see just how well he stands out.

Thanks, KernelTerror! The funny story about them is that I spontaneously asked my wife what color to paint my power weapons on my Grey Knights. She blurted out "pink" half-seriously and so I painted some power weapons gradiating from red to white. I actually really enjoyed the effect and stuck with it. Quite shiny!

Now comes another update, the completed Rapier Battery with Hades Autocannons!





Their bases turned out a lot better than I anticipated.

A wonderful megabattle was had over the last weekend. A Gathering Storm matchup was had, with a massive pair of armies showing to duke it out over Cadia's Last Stand. This battle was hosted at Games Workshop Victoria, BC to celebrate its 19th birthday (second oldest GW in the Western Hemisphere).

The photos...






Notable moments include the 3 Baneblades on the right flank, a Shadowsword and a Stormlord that held the mighty Creed (it turned out to be his death-sentence, however, as the Stormlord was blown up by the Despoiler himself and Creed had 3 strength 10, AP2 wounds randomly allocated to him. He didn't survive the experience). Also Banefist ascended to Daemonhood after murdering a Wolf Priest in Artificer Armor and then promptly got shot to death by 150 lasgun rounds. The Gods are fickle! The end result was a thorough Imperial victory (they slew well over 60 units to Chaos' 26). The presence of 6 superheavies on one end to 1 on the other probably didn't help matters.

We had a custom made cake for the occasion, too. And a commissar reading from the Uplifting Primer every phase of the game (there was much heckling by the forces of Chaos).