Battle For Salvation

This Columbus day weekend, I had the opportunity to travel up to New York to attend the the Battle for Salvation 40k GT and play in their first painting invitational tournament. This is the first time I have heard of such a thing, but the idea is great. Play in a GT, but make the painting score count for more. I love this spin on tournaments.

I think if you play 40k, and live within a 5 hour radius of BFS you should attend. The tournament is that good. The guys that run it are top notch, and each year they put me down as a club member even though I live 4 1/2 hours away.

BFS got me thinking about army sizes, game lengths, and tournaments in general. One of the things that I regret at a tournament is that I don't have enough time to mingle. There are so many people I want to meet, and so many friends from all over, that we end up never seeing each other at the tournament but instead end up staying out all night trying to catch up. Wouldn't it be great if game time at tournaments was reduced? Eight games at NOVA was too much for me, even though it was an incredibly fun narrative event.  Six games at BFS better. I think 5 games with a lower points value would be best. Let's got back to 1500 or 1200 points.

How about this for different spin. Let's play x8 1000 point games. Game time would decrease dramatically, but we'd still meet new people. It would also cut out a lot of the cheesy units

You should book your hotel now for the next event. Don't get Nynack Motor Lodged! (The good hotels fill up quickly)

The competition this year for painting was really tight. Chris Dubuque showed up with his Lamenters and took away best painted miniature for his dreadnought. I was lucky enough to win Paint Master for the painting invitational.

I am really proud of my Sons of Horus, that allows me to post photos of my latest creations. (hint--not so proud about them!) After the BFS paining award, I thought, "hey, maybe I'm a good painter after all" and tried to paint 16 WW2 US Army troops for Bolt Action in under 5 hours. This is why I don't paint IG. While the painting was fun, and the speed at which it happened was phenomenal, the minis are more like gestural pieces rather than art, but they are for a game I really want to try, and at least now I have some troops and a tank. 20 bucks for around 34 minis was not too shabby either. Ok, maybe I'll paint that other batch.

The moral here is simple. Don't get cocky. I did, and my desk is now covered in mud.

So there you go. A week in review. Go to BFS. You'll be happy you did.

Improved Smoke

In a few days I will be headed up to the Battle for Salvation in West Nyack New York. I haven't finished painting my army yet, but I think I've managed to create two nice looking smoke markers. I took a suggestion and balled up the cotton a bit. Now if only 40k had random unit activation.

Bolt Action British Sherman V WIP

Rather than paint up the missing bits to my BFS force, I decided to experiment with tamiya paint and a Bolt Action sherman tank. This is the first time I have really used Tamiya, as well as my first Bolt Action miniature.

So how was the paint? Good for airbrush, terrible for brush. As weird as that sounds, I could not get the paint to brush on easily, yet it was simultaneously the best air brush paint I have used. I only wish they had more colors.

How was the tank? Fun. It was a nice break from 40k. I am not a fan of the extremely soft white metal bits, but the casting is ok. A little misshapen, but it works pretty well. In terms of weathering,  I have yet to spatter mud all over the lower hull and tracks. Before I do that I want to base some troops so I can get an optimal color. The mud will be pigment mixed with sand and plaster, so I need to get it right.

Since I found out that some friends were getting interested in BA, I've been watching videos on how to play. So far, I really like the idea of random activation.  I can picture a squad advancing behind the sherman towards a fortified town. In game play terms that seems to work, so for once tanks are useful.

(sorry about the photos, my camera's battery died!)

Battle for Salvation

The Battle for Salvation GT is next weekend, so after being drafted into a painting invitational, I decided I had to add a little lighting to my display board.  This worked out well, since I've wanted to make tea lamp smoke markers for a while. I only wish I hadn't broken two of the lamps during construction. It would have been nicer to have all four so each vehicle had a dedicated destroyed marker.

I haven't mastered the cotton shaping in to smoke plumes yet, but I think it is going to look good in the end.

Yep, that is the 11th company podcast in the background. Neil, let's paint a rhino.

My BFS army. So, how broken is Adamantine Lance? I have to convert the rhino into a razorback, but then I think I am done.

The Great Blood Angels Salvage Pt2

It seems repainting or touching up an army is a relatively rare occurrence for most people. I know I've stripped models to add to new armies, but even for me this feels weird. I am immensely enjoying the process, however, since there are no expectations. I am not even bothering to carefully remove mold lines. Normally I would spend a lot of time prepping my models. That is the right way. But since these guys are already painted, and are getting new highlighting sprayed over their existing base coats, the focus is on getting them consistently paint chipped and streaked so I can move on to the mud/dust phase. I really like how that mud base turned out, and there is a good chance I will go with chocolate brown wet mud, with dried mud higher up on the vehicle chassis. I have to decide if I save that base type for my DKoK and leave the BA on desert bases. Desert bases would at least match my gaming table.

Yes... I hate the top hatch on the rhino. Maybe it is time to add stowage and gear up there. That would limit the glowing edges.

another thing of note, I have a batch of vallejo matte varnish that is blueing my models when it drys. Maybe vallejo always does this and I've just not noticed due to the colors I usually use.

EDIT
Greg asked for some before photos to go with these WIP repaint shots. It is kind of cool to point out, that I am not paint stripping these models. I am airbrushing directly over the original paint job. I thank Dave Taylor for the idea. We just did not have have enough time to paint strip the model, in time for the charity army raffle for the NOCF. Prior to his model, I can't remember ever repainting a model intended for use.

I've added a photo of my old Blood Angels force, painting in 2011. I've come a long way painting-wise. (tracks, chipping, streaking, and mud/weathering have not been completed) I am only mid-way through repainting the LR above. So far the Storm Raven has shown the most dramatic change.

Do You Re-Paint Old Armies?

I've embarked on a weird little project. Normally I will paint a few salvage pieces in order to see if I like a particular color scheme. I can't remember if I have ever updated and entire army. I just don't rebase, repaint, or upgrade armies. I pack them in a box and I move on. I think I am going to bulk update my old blood angels force. For some reason I have the desire to start playing the game more regularly. I thin my BA fit the bill.

So with that said, there are some challenges. The first is that I am being a little sloppy model preparation. There is none! The models come complete off my shelf. My construction skills have improved a lot since the time these models were glued together, so there are a lot of sloppy areas. On the other hand, by re-painting directly on top of an existing paint job, I can skip a lot of the detail work and just focus on the eye catching bits. Plus, it means I have a lot of tanks to weather and paint chip. I think that is a win.

On the basing side of things, I was thinking about doing muddy trampled earth with dead leaves and grass. This is my first attempt at mud after watching the how-to video over on Secret Weapon Miniatures. I like how it turned out.

It feels a bit strange updating models this way, but on the other hand, they are ready to play almost instantaneously.

Blood Angles Rhino WIP

Sometimes cleansing the palette is important. After NOVA I found myself besieged by projects. limited time due to a crazy work schedule, has left me with little time to properly plan for a next army project. I haven't even really felt like tackling a large project, consumed as I am with product launch for work. On the other hand, I paint to relieve stress. Rather than overwhelm myself with a lot of choices, I decided to finally try out the new(non Baal, so new to me!) GW reds on on a salvage rhino  paint stripped years ago and forgotten in a drawer.

Shading consists of:

• Mephiston Red
• Evil Suns Scarlet
• Wild Rider Red
• Paint Chip highlights with Troll Slayer Orange  

The rhino has a semi-gloss varnish on it right now, which makes it a little worse looking than normal. The varnish allowed me to add oils without ruining the base coats. With paint chips in place, I can now add decals followed by environmental effects. I might even find the tracks that were pulled off years ago.

Maybe it is time for a fresh BA army.

NOVA

(Borrowed from House of Paincakes)

(Borrowed from House of Paincakes)

(Borrowed from House of Paincakes)

(borrowed from Greg Hess)

The NOVA Open was incredible. I entered the Narrative event with my Sons of Horus army, and despite a grueling early morning/late evening game managed to help humanity loose the earth. We lost, and had a blast doing it. It is hard to describe how good the Narrative really is. It plays the way I want games to play. It is a sort of a "bring what you've always wanted to see on the tabletop" and let's make a scenario where it is fun.  The event is about camaraderie, and using story elements to ensure that everyone has a good time. The organizers, Owen and Steve, did an outstanding job. Will Nick and Kramer lead the forces of humanity to victory in space next year? How many desperate boarding actions will there be? The sky is the limit for the Narrative event. As players we dove right into the role playing aspect, and I think it showed. Hopefully next year we'll see  team missions, side boards, and asymmetric battlefields and missions. Sometimes winning means loosing ground more slowly than the other side expects. No-win scenarios can be fun. Maybe we'll even see fewer games and more strategy.

The NOVA Charitable foundation managed to earn 20k for Doctors Without Borders. The winner of the Ultramarines force was even a member of my favorite warhammer 30K forum. I was supposed to play a game with Terranraida, but the narrative schedule left me panting for breath between games. Hopefully we'll see a Kreig supported Imperial Fists force from him at next year's event.

I met a load of people this year. Todd Sherman and Greg Hess both of whom I have either blog-stalked or chatted with online were a lot of fun to hang out with. Both are great painters. Greg took a huge amount of photos, so if you want to see the huge breadth of painting at the NOVA Open, he is your man. Todd has one of my favorite Eldar armies. His stuff looks great in photos, but when you see it in person it is an order of magnitude better. Brian Ballard and Jeff Jenkins might even convince me to go to Adepticon for some 30k action. Jeff already has EC's so maybe I'll have to paint up another legion.

The Capitol Palette was a turning point for my painting. It still does not seem real to me.  My "Imperial Knight stomping on an EC contempter dreadnought" won Best of Show. I hadn't even considered that possible.  The German panthers won another gold, and the SoH land raider won a bronze. Even typing this right now it does not seem real to me. When I entered this year my primary goal was to get painting feedback. Last year a combination of seminars and paint judging by Justin McCoy spurred me to change my painting style. After last year's seminars I embraced weathering in a totally different way.  I even started chasing the military modeling community in order to learn their techniques. I can't think of a better endorsement for an event. I entered a competition, took a class, and that pointed me the right direction to push my painting. I am lucky so many people kept posting encouragement on this blog and in person. That helps more than you know.


It has been a great journey so far.

Thank you
-john