The first wave of Kastorel Novem terrain is finished!

Well, it's been a productive week hobby wise.  I have re-painted my realm of battle table, and 'finished'* my first batch of Ork themed Kastorel Novem terrain. 

So without further ado, here are some pics!

*As always, nothing is ever truely finished. 

Bugs inbound

Behold! 80 Genestealers and 4 Brood lords are now assembled - the core of a Tyranid army.  Just need to add a few Mawlocks and a Tyranid Prime and I have a third army.  Muahahahaha...

Oh, I also have 48 Blood Angel Terminators done too :-)

The Kastorel Novem Terrain work continues

I've now completed airbrushing the bases and buildings/ruins.  I have also finished drybrushes on the bases - first Tau Sept Ochre, followed by 1:1 Tau Sept Ochre and Skull White.  For the dry brushes I ended up using a 1.5" brush - it was a little weird using such a big brush, but it worked really well - and fast.

Next step is to drybrush the buildings with Astronomicon Grey (the airbrushed base coat was done with Adeptus Battlegrey).   I also airbrushed the broken up Aquila with Adeptus Battlegrey - was really happy with the result. 

I'm now thinking of pulling out the all other base coated terrain at the end of this batch, as with the airbrush/big drybrush combo, it goes really quick.

In other news, I've almost completely cleared my backlog of build work - I have some grots, a techmarine with servitors, dark elf metal kits, and a few other odd kits (a Valkyrie and a Leman Russ among them) and I'm done.  I'm thinking about holding off on the sub contracting for a while as a result.

Kastorel Novem work in progress

The bases have all been airbrushed with calthan brown, and I have also done an initial airbrush of adeptus battlegrey on the tower and mek shop.
On a side note, this is my first blog update from my Milestone Android phone using the Blogger app!

My to-do list

As always, I have a never ending list of things to do, but I thought I'd note down what I plan to work on in the near future:

1- Finish painting my Kastoral Novem themed terrain.
2 - Paint the realm of battle board to match
3 - Re-paint the bases on my Orks
4 - Paint my storm boyz, and any other units needed for my FOB Tourney list.
5 - Highlight my Ork trucks and battlewagons
6 - Apply basing materials to my Dark Elves
7 - Undercoat dark elves

There are a few items in there that will need expanding. 

A small but very enjoyable game of Apocalypse

Saturday night saw Jordan, Allistair and new gamer Luke (Hi Luke) come over for a small Apocalypse game of 4000ish points.  I ran 200 points of Blood Angels, Allistair allied with me and ran about 1850pts worth of Grey Knights.  Across the table Jordan ran 4000pts of Chaos, split between daemons and CSMs, along with Rusty, his Reaver Titan (I've been calling it Rusty in an effort to get Jordan using the name) and Luke ran approx. 800pts of Tyranids.  TO beef up our side Allistair also ran my Baneblade.

We played on a 6'x8' table made up of my 'rough' realm of battle table, and Allistairs 'ski field' realm of battle table, which we suspect he polishes between games just to listen to Jordan grumble about Bloodletters skiing down the slopes.  The mission was normal Apocolypse.

Overall it was a lot of fun.  I tried out the 'Dantes Sanguinary Host' formation, with Dante, an Honour Guard, and three squads of Sangunary Guard.  I matched that up with two Baal Predators - one with flamestorm and heavy flamers, the other with TL Assault Cannon and heavy bolters.  I then added two furioso dreadnoughts - one vanilla and one librarian.  Both in Drop pods with deathstorm launchers.

A few highlights - Indestructable Paladins holding our right flank, wiping our nearly all of Lukes Nids, then taking on two big mobs of Bloodletters, along with Skull taker, and taking one casualty in the whole game.  Gotta love the Nemesis Warding Staff - if you're the one with the knights.    Dante collected the head of a Bloodthirster - got to explore Honour Guards a bit more - they proved to be an excellent companion to Dante - and they can have Storm Shields.

A few lessons learned - it takes a Titan to kill a Titan.  Failing that, at least three super heavy tanks.  The lone Baneblade just couldn't knock off void sheilds fast enough (they kept regenerating) and the rest of the force just lacked the punch necesary to take it out.  Also, Sangunary Guard are definately a 'scissors' unit - very good against normal troops, but they fall like leaves when facing anything with power weapons (e.g other scissors units, and most rocks).  Building a list made up almost exclusively of SG is not a good idea.  Next time substitute at least one unit for Terminators, and if they are the only troops, don't put them all in one place.

Luke did ok considering it was his first game.  Admittedly an Apocalypse game may not be the best way to start.

The Mega Armoured Nobz (a.k.a. MANz) are DONE!

Well, it was one of the more drawn out painting jobs I've done, but they are finally finished!  Every once in a while I encounter a stumbling point in a painting project.  I think this is closely akin to writers block.  I just can't seem to get through the next step in the process.  This happened with the MANz, and it lasted over a year.  Finally broke the deadlock last week, and behold, the results:

Updated Ork Painting Method

Given my recent change in base painting, I thought I'd update my 'standard Ork painting method'.  Looking at the method, which I wrote several years and a hundred or so painted Orks ago, I've made some other 'tweaks' to the method also.

1. Drybrush Codex Grey, then Fortress Grey, then Astronomicon Grey in successive coats on the whole model, using a big brush and very little paint.
2. Overbrush all weapons, some armour, and key parts of the Kans, Dred and MANz Boltgun Metal.
3. Paint all skin Knarloc Green.
4. Pick out some armour, gun parts and other minor details in Dwarf Bronze.
5. Paint belts and straps Beastial Brown.
6. Spray wash with 1 coats of Badab Black.
7. Spray wash with 1 coat of Devlan Mud
8. Pick out detail and paint chips and scratches with Chainmail.
9. Highlight skin with Goblin green
10. Top highlight skin with 1:1 mix of Goblin Green and Bleached Bone
11. Paint base Calthan Brown
12. Drybrush base Tausept Ochre
13. Second Drybrush of base 1:1 mix of Tausept Ochre and Skull White
14. Paint teeth snakebite leather
15. Paint eyes bleached bone
16. Highlight teeth bleached bone
17. Paint eyes blood red (fully covering the bleached bone)
18. Extreme highlight teeth white
19. Paint any minor details unique to any models

Bases completed

Ok, so I've completed the bases as per my last entry, and thought I'd provide the pics I promised.  First, the bestial brown basecoat:

Then, the vomit brown drybrush, followed by a second drybrush of 1:1 vomit brown and skull white:

Overall I'm pretty happy - the effect I was after is certainly achieved, but....

Turns out, the brown and ochre paints that come with the large terrain kit are a little different.  I may need to try those out next.

New base colour for da boyz

Well, I've bitten the proverbial bullet and changed my core colour scheme for the Orks a bit.  I'm laying down a new base colour on the bases for the Meganobz I'm painting at the moment, and from the looks of it, I'd say I'll then be going back over the rest of my painted Orks and changing things up a bit.

The new base colour scheme is:

1. Bestial Brown, applied liberally
2. Vomit brown drybrush
3. 50/50 Vomit brown/skull white drybrush

The goal of the new base is twofold - one, I need to better 'separate' the models from the bases - they we're getting lost, and looked like black blobs on the table - not black clad Orks.  Second, I'm building up my game board and terrain to be 'desert' theme, which means applying the same colour scheme.  It will tie everything together, and should look a lot nicer than it does currently.

I'll put up some pics shortly.

Some of my painting

It occured to me that I haven't put up many pictures of completed work (or perhaps I should say 'none at all').  Part of the problem is a lack of quality photos, part is due to the fact that I seldom think of a model as 'done'. 

So apologies for the poor photo quality, and bear in mind these are not quite finished - heres a selection of some of my painted works.

Terrain and build work continues, but now - the airbrush!

This week sees a lot of terrain ready for paint, with more in production:

I've also got a lot of build work underway or complete - three land speeders, two furioso dreads (one upgraded to a librarian), five more Snguinary guard, five honour guard, five more death company, two drop pods, a razorback, five meganobz, a wierd boy, three more kommandos, nine Nobs, twenty assault marines, three killa kanz and a deff dread (old metal ones), five scouts, and maybe a few other items I'm forgetting.

I'm also assembling a Stormraven, but I have paused assembly to paint the interior cabin.  The plan is to airbrush and weather the interior.  I have undercoated in black, and done an initial coat of Kommando Khaki:

A close up for a bit of detail:

Next I'll airbrush over a light layer of skull white, to highlight.

Blood Angels vs. Daemon Horde of Khorne

I played a 2000pt game vs. Jordan last night, me running Blood Angels, him running Chaos Daemons.  My list looks like this:

Mephiston
5 Sternguard with 1x Combi-melta and 1x power fist
5 Assault terminators, 2x lightning claws, 3x T-hammers and Storm shields, mounted in a LS Redeemer with multi melta upgrade.
1 Furioso Dreadnought with blood talons, meltagun and storm bolter.
2x 10 Assault Marines, with 1x flamer and 1x melta in each squad, both with power fisted sergeants.
5 Scouts with sniper rifles
2 Baal Predators, one with Assault Cannon and heavy bolter sponsons, the other with flamestorm and heavy flamer sponsons, both with storm bolters.
1 Vindicator

Jordan ran:
1 Bloodthirster*
Skulltaker
6 Bloodcrushers*
3x 10 Bloodletters*
2x 3 Flamers of Tzeench*
1x Demon Prince*
6 Fleshhounds, including Karnack*
Herald of Khorne riding Juggernaught*

*There were a number of Gift upgrades that I can't be bothered listing

We played a capture and control game with  three objectives, spearhead deployment.  I won the roll off and chose to go second.  I then deployed my dread and landraider on the table, and held everything else in reserve. 

What went well?
Well, for starters, I won, with two objectives contested, and one held.  Mephiston was the game winner, spending several rounds duking it out with the Bloodthirster (which had a 2+ inv. save againt Mephs force sword - gotta love initiative seven) then in the last two turns, killing the BT, and hoofing it 22 inches across the table in one turn to assault the bloodletter squad holding the rearmost objective.  He killed a swath of them, and despite him being down to one wound, and not getting a save against their power swords, still survived (gotta love toughness six) to contest the objective.
I also used a lot of template weapons (possibly too much) which worked a treat.  The flamestorm Baal was just vicious, torching the fleshhounds and karnak, then incinerating a good quantity of bloodletters.  The landraider reliably claimed kills every turn, and the other Baal, in spite of being assaulted early on by the Bloodthirster and getting immobilised, did a great job of thinning out the third Bloodletter squad - with a lot of help from the vindicator.

What didn't go well?
The scout achieve little other than giving the bloodletters on the rear objective something to practice their butchering skills on while they sat in a quiet corner of the board.
I should have started the vindicator and the Baals on the table, albeit near the edge, as I lost two turns worth of shooting waiting for them.

Overall it was a close and very fun game.  Jordan is still learning the best use of his Daemons, and I'm still adapting to my new Blood Angel codex - but I feel I've come a long way in dealing with Daemons since facing them at Fields of Blood 2009.

Stormravens incoming

Just a quick update today.  Work continues on my terrain, with an Ork watchtower and a rubble pile in progress.  I'll get some pics up soon.

Assembly work is also moving along at a brisk pace, with two drop pods, three land speeders, ten assault marines, five Ork Meganobz, four Ork Kommandoes with special weapons and a marine attack bike underway.

This weekend I'll be playing Jordans Khorne demon army - I'm going to run my Blood Angels again, and if I have time to assemble it, perhaps he will feel the wrath of the Stormraven!

The Mek Shop

I've completed the build work on the first of my 'Orky terrain' builds - behold, the Mek Shop:

Just need to paint it and it's done.  I'm going to get it undercoated, then paint it, along with the rest of the builds, in one big mad painting dash.

In other news, my builds are coming along nicely - the weekend saw all of this completed:

Terrain time

The build work continues  with four Ork bikers and eight space marine bikers underway, and 5 sternguard, 5 vanguard and 10 Ork Kommandos are in the pipeline.

But now I'm thinking my terrain needs a bit of love.  Allistair, one of my gaming friends, is interested in playing through the 'Raid on Kastoral Novem' campaign with me starting in April, which will require some orky junkyard terrain.  I've been meaning to get some terrain organised for some time now, so this is as good a motivator as any. 

I'll also need to get my build team focused on Orks for the next month.

More assembly underway

Well, the DeffDred is done and I'm now tackling some 'special' marines for my Blood Angels: 

• Two meltagun totin, jump pack wearing assualt marines
• Two flamer totin, jump pack wearing assualt marines
• One power sword totin, jump pack wearin Sanginary Priest
• One Blood champion with jump pack for my honour guard

The assualt marines will let me pad out the special weapons choices on my two current squads.  I need two more squads assembled, and I need two squads of vanguard veterans and one or two squads of sternguard veterans befoee I'll consider the jump troops done.

I've also decided to bump my non-jump pack death company to 16 marines, so that they can fill out a land raider if needed.

It's been an age...

It has been a great many moons since last I put virtual quill to virtual ink to scribe my thoughts for the world to weigh...

So thaty means enough guff!  I'm likley the only one reading this  (if not please do say hello).  So I'm going to use it in a more shorthand manner to keep track of my hobby goings on for myself.

First note - I had game against Alistair last week - the first since July!  Played his Dark Eldar from the new codex vs. my Blood Angels using a mission from the battles book.  I won!

Builds are getting back underway, with this week seeing the completed assmbly of 3 killa kans, 5 sanguinary guard, 5 Deffkoptas (in progress), 4 Ork bikers (in progress) and 1 Deff Dred (in progress).

How am I getting so much done?  Sub-contracting!