Terrain Update - Anti-Tank Warfare and Barricades!

After spending the last couple of weeks painting Miniatures, I thought it would be a fine change of pace to paint some terrain.  Of the items I purchased from Amera Plastic Mouldings last year, there were still plenty of items that were yet demanding my attention.  After finishing the Chaos Lord last week, I felt it was time to dedicate some more time to expanding my 40K terrain collection.  Last year I managed to paint a couple of Craters and some Barricades, and copied the paint scheme so that the pieces looked coherent when placed on the same battlefield. 

As can be seen in the pics above, the paint scheme is simple enough – Scorched Brown base with successive highlights of Bubonic Brown and Bleached Bone for all the earth, followed by a heavy coating of Devlan Mud.  The stone was a base-coat mix of Chaos Black and Codex Gray, with subsequent highlights of Codex Grey and Fortress Grey before being washed with Badab Black.  The edges of all the bases were painted using Chardon Granite before being sealed using a Matte Varnish.  All in all I’m very happy with the outcome, especially since it was such an easy effect to produce.  I’ll be looking forward to applying the same effect on ruined buildings that I intend to work on in the near future.  Pics of the completed items have been included below.

With the terrain done, it’s time for me to move onto my next project, which will be the Standard Bearer from by Chosen Unit in my Warriors of Chaos Army.  For a long time now the main body of the model has been painted and I’ve held off painting the rest because it was never base-coated.  Now that I have the bronze spray paint, that excuse is pretty weak.  It's high time the banner and shield were completed so that I can finally assemble the fellow and he can actually go to war without feeling self-conscious about his blu-tacked arm.

The second project that I'm working on is a new Blood Claw for my Space Wolves.  They are one of my favorite units in the Codex despite the hate they cop on the Interwebz.  I maintain that a unit of 8 with a Wolf Priest and a Wolf Guard can make a dent in anyone's army when they assault.  Ah well, we'll get this fella done first and see how we go from there.

Well, that's all from me, I'm off to continue putting paint on some minis before I hit the sack.  Gotta get my #brushtime stats up on Twitter.

Catch you all later

Trev

WoC Update: Completed Chaos Lord

It seems that my hobbying side has received a shot in the arm lately in regards to my desire to paint.  With both my Warhammer Armies (40K and Fantasy alike) receiving several new miniatures in relatively short order.  Once again my Warriors of Chaos will receive a new figure in the form of a Chaos Lord armed with two hand-weapons.

The model used the previous Exalted Champion of Khorne mini and with a small hand and head swap to match the rest of my army.  A good deal of time was also spent filing off all the Khorne Icons so that I could make him generic enough to pass muster as one of the favoured of Tzeentch.  All in all I think the model has come out really well all things considered, though it may be time for me to focus again on getting rank-and-file models painted.  The Norsca in Flames Campaign will be resuming in three weeks and I’d like to have bolstered the ranks of my army with some extra models by then. 

But that’s in three weeks, right now, my current WIP project is some terrain that I started last weekend.  These tank traps were purchased from Amera Plastic Mouldings and are a blast to paint.  Hopefully I’ll have some extra pieces to bolster my collection of 40K terrain very shortly. 

Catch you all later.

Trev 

Salamander Update: WIP Progress

After getting excited about painting Space Marines again, I've been spending a bit of time adding some extra models to my fledgling army.  Most of it has been models that were needed for the Tournament, but some of them have been done with the future of the army in mind. 

As a quick project closure, I finished painting the backpack of this Blood Claw that I started way back when.  I'm pretty sure the paint job on that suit of armour is about 2 years old which is a little sad really...

The first off the ranks are the Long Fangs toting Heavy Bolters.  These are part of a trio that spent the tournament raining shells of hot death upon the enemy.  Their 9 shots means that I’m able to spray a small unit (or the remainder of a larger one) or a light vehicle and actually have a chance of doing some damage.  I look forward to seeing what they can do against someone who’s not in power armour.

The next model is the Chooser of the Slain model that I build for use with my Librarian I built recently.  I fancy the serpents to be psychic constructs of juvenile Drakes that inhabit Nocturne, hence the lighter skin tones. 

Finally the last model is that of a Sergeant armed with a combi-plasma that will most likely join a unit of Grey Hunters that is already armed with Plasma Guns and perhaps even a Plasma Pistol.  This will create a very powerful anti-infantry squad that can be deployed against Heavy Infantry / Monstrous Creature with a very good chance of bringing them down.   I’m looking forward to building that unit once I've completed my Blood Claws. 

Before I go, here’s a pic of my current WIP project that I’m working on (at least one of many) and it is one that I hope will be completed by the end of the month.  This one has been a long time coming and I’m looking forward to having another Lord / Hero model for my Chaos Warriors fully painted.

Catch you all later

Trev 

Tournament Update: Into the Fires of Battle..

Unto the Anvil of War!!  Today saw my Salamander Army attend the first Tournament of 2012 and performed stupendously.  The players pack for the event created by Mark over at Project Circle can be found here.  My army I took was as followed:

Rune Priest
3 Wolf Guard
Dreadnought
10 Grey Hunters
10 Grey Hunters
Long Fangs
Vindicator

The Rune Priest was tooled up almost to the max, while the Long Fangs took a combination of Heavy Bolters and Multi-melta.

For the most part, the vast majority of the army was fully painted in time for the Tournament with the sole exception of the Dreadnaught.  Thankfully, Mark was kind enough to lend me his own fully painted Dread so I was able to field a fully painted army.

Game 1: Salamanders vs Blood Angels

My first game was against a Blood Angels army that contained a heavy contingent of Jump Infantry backed up by a Tactical Squad and a pair of Attack Bikes.  The mission was Seize Ground with the Pitched Battle Deployment.

My opponent Raymond was plagued with some pretty shoddy rolls, which when combined with my Tempest Wrath psychic power forcing his Jump infantry to take Dangerous Terrain rolls as the came ever closer to my Librarian.  With some impressive shooting phases by my Long Fangs and Grey Hunters eventually whittled down his army to the point that I was able to concentrate my forces against his Tactical Marines.  In the final turn, Raymond made a noble last stand, with such ferocity that even Sanguinius himself would have been proud.  Against a power weapon, a force weapon and a Power fist in the squad, the outcome was all but predetermined.

Result:  20 points

Game 2: Dark Angels vs Salamanders

The second game was against the bye-buster army that Mark created for the Tournament using his Dark Angels.  The very mobile MSU army list was not exactly suited for the Annihilation mission with a Dawn of War deployment. 

Once again, my concentrated fire approach went very well, allowing me to pound on transports until the units inside were forced to disembark and could use the Grey Hunters to shoot them to death.  The game ended with a second victory, though in this case, I was unable to kill his Jump-pack Chaplain, I wasn’t able to secure the extra Tournament Points. 

Results: 15 points.

Game 3: Salamanders vs Blood Angels

The third game was against a custom Chapter using the Blood Angels codex.  The army contained a number of different elements including a Tactical Squad, Assault Marines, Dreadnought, a Devastator Squad and a custom-made Attack Bike using a Landspeeder Kit and old Trukk components.  The mission for this game was a Seize Ground using the Spearhead deployment.

It’s at about this stage that you, dear reader may see a pattern forming.  Considering I chose this Codex for its Assault potential, I was spending an awful lot of my time holed up in cover shooting the snot out of everything that stuck its head out and presented itself as a target.  As in the previous two games, I played the shooting game again, determined that Damo, my valiant opponent wasn’t going to shift me from my objective.  Additionally, I was determined to use my overwhelming weight of fire to hopefully blow him off my objective. 

The plan went well enough, though I continued to forget to use my Tempest’s Wrath psychic power that allowed Damo’s Assault Marines to close in and blow the main weapon off my Vindicator.  Focusing fire on the squad holding his objective, he was forced to re-deploy his Assault Marines, pulling them back cement his hold of his home objective and pulling off a tie.

Result: 15 points

Game 4: Salamanders vs Chaos Marines

The fourth and final game was an Annihilation mission with Pitched Battle deployment.  This was a solid army run by Ryan, an opponent that almost always guarantees a fun game.  His army was Khornate themed, consisting of 3 Vindicators and two squads of Marines in Rhinos led by Kharne the betrayer. 

3 Vindicator Tanks is a level of shooting power that is difficult to counter with the army that I created.  Thankfully, with a flurry of good shooting rolls, I managed to disable or destroy all 3 Vindicators over the course of two shooting phases.  A series of unfortunate assaults, including the pointless sacrifice of my Dreadnought in a pointless assault against Kharne’s unit (that bastard is a monstrous creature in combat WTF?!?!?!?!?) saw my entire army shredded with the exception of my Long Fang unit, and Ryan’s assault force reduced to just Kharne (I use the word ‘just’ very loosely here).  It’s like saying ‘I managed to reduce my opponent’s army to just a Warhound Titan.’ 

Surging forward, Kharne rushed towards my remaining Long Fangs, only barely stopping short of assault range due to the presence of a section of defensive barricade.  Desperate and running out of options, my Long Fangs did the one thing they know best – Filled the air between them and their target with the Emperor’s Wrath causing three wounds in the process – 2 from the Heavy Bolters and 1 from the Multi melta.  With desperate anticipation, I watched as Ryan rolled the two armour saves inflicted by the Heavy Bolters, failing both.  With one wound left, it was down to the cover save from the Multi melta.  As the dice tumbled across the table, my heart stopped as the dice came to rest on a.... three – killing Kharne outright and winning me the game. 

Result: 20 points

With the fourth and final game completed, it was all over except for the awards ceremony.  Ryan walked away with a well-earned Third Place, while Damo secured both second place and player’s choice for best army (also very well deserved).  In a shocking twist of fate, I was actually awarded First Place (a shock for everyone I can assure you, especially me!).  Hopefully this is the beginning of a very positive 2012.  The secondary effect has been that I’ve gotten quite jazzed about 40K again, which will hopefully mean that I’ll be painting more Space Marines as well. 

Well, that’s all for this Tournament Report, I’m hoping it wasn’t too long and drawn out.  If you have any suggestions to make it more interesting (more pictures is already on my list), feel free to let me know. 

Catch you all later,

Trev

Salamander Update: The purging Flame

Used from 40K Wikia without permission

After an almost 3 year hiatus from the Tournament scene, my Salamanders will once again take to the ‘competitive’ field of battle for the glory of the Emperor and their Chapter in a 1000 point 1-day event run by Mark – author of the Project Circle blog. 

Preparation for this Tourney has seen my Marines receive some much-needed attention at my painting desk, in an attempt to field an army that is at least completely base-coated.   My Vindicator was the first of many models to receive some much-needed attention.  A relic from several editions previous, I had completed the majority of the painting for a tournament held about 3 years back.  Now that the gunner and other miscellaneous details are painted, I can safely say that this fellow is finally complete.

 The Librarian was the next model to receive my attentions.  Having relied on a Deathwatch Librarian for the last couple of years, I felt it was high time I actually made one for my Salamanders using the Sanguinary Guard Box.  As can be seen below, the conversion went very well, providing me with a model that is filled with dynamic movement and a great deal of character. 

 Finally, I’ve been working on getting two new Long Fangs painted (both with Heavy Bolters), as well as getting the plastic Assault cannon Dreadnought arm built and undercoated.  As per my WIP challenge, I hope to have these models completed by the end of the week, if not by the end of the month. 

 I hope to write up a tournament report Sunday afternoon, though that may be delayed until late Monday / Tuesday depending on how I’m going for time. 

Catch you all later

Trevor 

WoC Update: Avatar's of Wulfrik Pt 02

As a follow-up to the previous article, I wanted to finish reviewing the Avatar's of War Marauder Champion painting project I completed last December.  With the base-coating completed, I was able to begin filling in the fine details on the miniature which is the part of the painting process that I enjoy the most.  Like all the miniatures that Avatars of War produce, fine detail was not something this model was lacking in any respect which is both enjoyable and a little intimidating at the same time.  Considering the time that I've invested in the model, I'm very happy with the finished product, possibly with the exception of his shield which I feel could have a little more depth to it.  I've included a multitude of additional WIP pictures as well as a couple of pics of the finished model from a couple of angles.

Finally, before I go, I wanted to include a picture of another project that I'm working on this month in preparation for a 1000 point 40K Tournament to be held in a weeks time.  No doubt I'll be posting pics of the completed model in the very near future.

Catch you all later

Trev

A New Year, a new set of Resolutions

My WIP Vindicator for my 4th Resolution

With a New Year beginning, like many other bloggers that I follow (Mark at Project Circle and Lenny from Tales from the Lennycave), I wanted to make a couple of resolutions that will shape my hobby development over the coming year.  After reading articles from both afore mentioned sites, I’ve developed a list of resolutions that contain restrictions of my own devising as well as some blatantly nicked from both Mark and Lenny.  

1. For each miniature I purchase for a Tabletop Wargame, I will paint 2 minis that I already have.  Like both Mark and Lenny, I'm hoping this will curb my impulsive spending as well had encourage me to paint  the minis I already possess.  The hard part will be when I run out of half-painted miniatures to work on and have to actually start from scratch again...
2. All miniatures purchased between the 1st of January 2012 and 31st of October 2012 will be fully painted by the end of 2012.
3. Paint at least one piece of terrain each month.  For multi-part structures, each component will count as a separate piece of terrain.  
4. Include a picture of whatever WIP project that is currently sitting on my painting bench with each blog article I post.  This item will then be completed within a month of the picture being taken.

With my resolutions decided upon, the only thing left to do is to make good on the 4th one.  As can be seen above, I've included a picture of my latest WIP project - a Vindicator Tank for my Salamander Space Marines.  While the majority of the miniature was painted previously for the last 40k tournament that was held by the Kingaroy Wargamers, I never got around to finishing the gunner that sits in the top cupola.  Thus far I've managed to paint the Marine's armour and complete the first sides of each of the tank hatches that will be providing him with a bit of protection from flanking fire.  While I've schedules a month to get him completed, I'm hoping that it will take much less time than that.  

Catch you all later

Trev