Screamers of Tzeentch: Back In The Saddle

I've spent so long building my Thunderhawk, that I have had very little time to do some painting, so when a few hours became available I decided to paint up some Chaos Deamons I had tucked away in my GW closet. (yes...a full closet...a mini store....) I learned quite a few things from picking up the brush and air brush after months and months of non-painting.

The first thing is that having a filler army, or an army that you paint in between your 'real' armies is really nice to have. I have two filler armies, Deamons and Chaos Marines. When I am hesitating to paint my blood angels, templars, ultramarines, krieg, tallarn, or voystroyan, I can always pick up a unit of Daemons or CM to brush up my skills, try new things, and generally get myself back into the groove. The reason this is important is that there is no self imposed guildlines on my painting. I don't care if my Deamons are themed or not. I do not care one bit about the army list. I have never played Daemons nor will I likely play them. (well maybe at the 1500 pt range someday!) Basically filler armies or units are no stress. I want my Ultramarine force to look spectacular. That brings a lot of baggage along with it.

The other great thing about filler armies/units that that they introduce a pause in army building. I am going to paint a small Black Templar force soon, but after that I am unsure what should follow. A huge purchase of Tallarn would argue for them to be the next big thing. However the Horus Heresy book has thrown a wrench into my whole plan. All those FW units I have been hoarding for my Ultramarines may have to end up as Loyalist Emperor's Children. (the screamers may have been a test of my purple skills for the ECs)

It feels good to be back in the saddle.

Fake Forgeworld

Two of my winning bids on Ebay arrived today, one for rhino doors, and the other for storm shields. Both orders appear to be fakes. A couple of things make me think this. First, the resin is more brittle than other FW models I have. (I have a lot of FW, so I have seen everything!) Second, the pieces are oily, and have muted detail and lack of density. Although muted, the detail is better than what I have gotten on my own castings of my bases, so it would seem this is from some pseudo professional service. Now I don't know for certain that these are forgeries, but they are off just enough for me to doubt them.

Had I suspected these were forgeries, I would not have bought them. I've been avoiding purchasing any FW stuff from any seller in Russia for this reason. The other thing that made these seem real was that the prices were good but not awesome.

So what do I do now? Should I dump these? Should I mail them off to FW, so they can be reviewed? I could just paint them up.

Any suggestions?

So I lost a bet at NOVA

I lost by so much, that I am now required to paint Necrons or Black Templars. I have Necrons, which means it is only fair if I paint Black Templars.

So what can I do with Templars? I need to paint an allied list. Any ideas what I should paint? I need to fulfill the minimum. I'd like to paint units that have great models as well.