Battle For Salvation Thunderhawk Recovery Force

Updated with new photos above

I wasn't able to get my real camera to work this morning, something about battery exhausted. So we'll have to make do with more blurry iphone photos. I had t post photos, because I am really proud of how this army is turning out. I plan to go back and re-weather the storm talon's after BFS to bring them in-line with the new painting style. Right now they lack oil washes, which makes them stand out quite a bit. I hope I am able to win at least one game with this army. I'd gladly accept a tie. I think with three full squads, I should at least be able to control one of my objectives. At the NOVA narrative I noticed that my army folded once close combat monsters got in range. Hopefully I can produce two bastions, using the dread to anchor two squads and the terminators and one squad anchoring the other. That leaves the scouts to hitch a ride in a rhino and sit on some other objective. The captain may join them to give them a little punch. Outside of that I plan to castle up.

After the experience making this board, I really want to make a full city table with ruined building and downed aircraft. I really want to play a game on a table where this board would be just one piece of the terrain. Too bad I used a non-standard size!

Battle For Display Board: Thunderhawk Down

May I present Thunderhawk Down, the display board that accompanies my Ultramarines 315th Expeditionary Chapter (pre-heresy eventually). I have no idea what possessed me to rip apart a display board and give myself a nightmarish amount of painting two days before hitting the road to New York, but the painter abides.

I'll take better photos of the army on the board tomorrow morning when the light is better, but the idea was to present a crashed thunderhawk being recovered by ultramarines. At this phase in the construction the model was still semi-gloss varnished and hadn't had the overall dusting of thinned down graveyard earth that is necessary to set the model back into the terrain.

I really can't believe I completed this. It goes to show how important weathering is as a painters tool. The more I look at it the more I want to surround the hawk with tallarn desert raiders in their yellows and greens, or kroot in their earth tones. I've always loved the movie Flight of the Phoenix, and seeing the hawk incorporated into a desert tent marketplace would be pretty interesting.  Think aliens, using the structure to build other make shift structures as part of some dessert bazaar.

I hope this display excites gamers at the GT. After all, I am not going there to win. (one came would be nice) If anyone else is going to BFS,  stop by and say hello. I'll be the guy with the crashed thunderhawk and the Ultramarine scouts ;)

Ultramarines & Battle For Salvation

My wife and I decided to head up to New York for the Battle For Salvation tournament. So lots of gaming for me, and lots of time in New York city for her. We needed a break from DC, so the tournament came at a perfect time. As is now tournament standard for me, I don't have a fully painted force, or at least a fully painted one that I want to run. I had to paint another tac squad. Fortunately for me I was out of generic plastic marines, so the new tac box was required.

I've read a lot of disappointment online about the new plastic tactical squad box. I am a hobbyist, and for me the new tac squad is just what I wanted. It is familiar, but at the same time crisper and with better poses. I love some of the new details, like the MK 8 backpack see on my sergeant above. I love how washes cling to the crevices making it really easy to highlight. Now, I wish there were no purity seals, since I've never really liked those details, but these are easy to paint. (mine are not done by the way--just the first thin coat of paint on)

How are these guys armed? With the new stuff obviously! I don't know how useful grav weapons are, but I armed the sergeant and the specialist with them just to paint up something different. The grav sculpts are a little weird, but I am happy to see something different on marines.


Now I just have to finish painting and base them....and put transfers on...and weather them.....

Did I mention that I might just grab my Blood Angels instead...oh the choices. At least the BA dex is not digital. (my SM dex is the ipad version and I can't keep it from crashing)

Warhound Now With Weapons

The end is in sight! I still have a lot to paint on the warhound, but enough of the model is now put together that I would not feel embarrassed fielding it in a game. It is coming close to the time when she will have to walk. (walk is the term for military planetfall for titans)

Now the bad news is that I glued some of the hose ports on the wrong gun, so I need to do some prying re-glueing and re-painting. Then the crew will see some paint. I also have to either cast a replacement shoulder cap, or build one, to replace the one I lost. Those will cover the shoulder ball joints which you can see on the photo.

There are ample opportunities for weathering, but I am going to wait until I figure out the decal/freehand situation. The Ledio Astorum have a morning star for their symbol, and I need to work that in somehow. I may try to print my own decals, and use them as templates, but who knows.

Warhound: Part 45345454345

 I love GW Tin Bitz. I am down to my last two pots. This makes me sad. Not as bad as being down to my last Bolt Gun Metal pot, but sad just the same.

On the other hand, despite running out of two old range paints, I am really pleased with how the metal portions are coming on the model. They still need highlighting and washes, but I think vents are starting to look cool. Overall, the warhound is really starting to shape up. I am undecided if I should spray a matte varnish on this guy. She already has a coat of Purity Seal, which was necessary for the oil washes. Decals and Oil washes are still to come, so she'll be shiny for a bit longer.

So how about a real name for this beast?

She Walks: Tempestuous B****

Today I decided it would be good to finally make this titan walk. Enough of the interior was finally complete enough for glueing, out came the dastardly sticky stuff. Let me introduce Tempestuous B**** of Legio Astorum. A new name will follow I assure you, but that was the name I gave her when the green and white striped right shoulder came apart and landed in my lap, coating my right leg in super glue.

Modeling Rule #239: Wear pants when modeling.


This is not the most dynamic pose, but with the legs pre-glued there was not a whole lot I could do. Perhaps this Warhound stands duty guarding the Ultramarines gene-stores. That is plausible enough.

Workspace

Very little painting has been accomplished. However I did manage to do all kinds of weird damage to my titan's interior using AK-Interactive's interior acrylic paint. I air brushed it on, and somehow it produced all kinds of furry threads all over the interior.  I scraped off all those I found, and I have just resprayed some bone white over the weirdest furry patches. In the end most of this stuff can't be seen really well, so I am not inclined to simple green this guys. I think it will turn out ok any way.

NOVA Recap

The NOVA open was a blast. I met a lot of new friends, and had the opportunity to reconnect with old ones. Very little sleep was had.

Rather than play in the GT, my Ultramarines supported humanity against the virtue in the narrative event. Despite failing at nearly every battlefield encounter, they managed to win best painted for me.

The Narrative event itself was loads of fun. For years to come I suspect, Supreme Allied Commander of Humanity Owen, SACOH, will wonder if perhaps a few of his field commanders were Virtue double agents. He should probably just blame it on the Space Marine Scout Bikers like everyone else. There will be more scouts next year. Clearly what I did wrong was fail to bring enough of them.

The painting competition was very difficult this year, which is great news for the NOVA. One of my entries, the EC Dreadnought, earned me a bronze. I am very pleased about that.  Winning two painting awards is really special. I've been upping my painting quality slowly over time, but the forcing function of the competition made me spend more time than I normally would on both of those models. I intend to paint the rest of my EC's up to that quality or higher, so hopefully I am ready with a heresy list for NOVA 2014. I am also planning to submit multiple entries next year into fantasy, 40k, and Historic. I may paint a version of me 'from last week' for the historic category and see how it does. The model would be me holding a scale model of me. It would be fun to wear the 'me from last week' outfit when I hand in the entry as well. It is bordering on performance art, but I like the meta aware quality the piece would have.

The only thing I want to add to NOVA is a fully stocked painting room. I think it would be a blast to while away the days painting mini's while waiting for the narrative to start. Maybe we could borrow Dave Taylor's idea of a painter's lounge.

Oh, yeah about that model. I just wanted to play around with the hairspray technique for chipping. This is not part of any particular army, but rather a way for me to experiment. Originally it was slated to become a piece of no-mans-land terrain for my DKoK.  I am rather taken by the leaking oil effects though.

I hope everyone had a blast at NOVA. You will be seeing me next year.

*EDIT
I added some photos in better light. I am really happy with the spilled oil around the oil caps on the back of the centaur. In better light it should be easier to tell this is in Death Guard colors.