Tin Bitz

Matt drops the Hammer

2011-06-08T20:03:00.000-07:00

This is a well made argument video by Matt from Miniwargaming.com. It's directed toward GW on how they treat their local retailers. Check it out.

From Matt @ MiniWarGaming.com
Many gamers have requested people to post this on their sites/blogs and I think it's a good idea.

To Games Workshop:

This is meant to be constructive, so please watch with an open mind.

I know we would all love to have a response to this, in whatever form you choose.

To everybody else:

If you agree with what you see here, please help spread the word by posting this video on your blogs, discussing it on forums, and anything else you can do.

Think of it as some sort of online petition to help Games Workshop improve their policies.

Also, if any website got you into, or back into, a particular wargame, please take this survey:
http://www.miniwargaming.com/survey

Taking the survey will help show the importance of websites to keep this hobby alive.

He asks that you share this video on your site and spread the word. If enough people speak up maybe they will listen.

Too many mouths to feed!

2010-11-19T21:02:00.000-08:00

Ah yes, who doesn't love Flamers of Tzeentch? Probably your opponent, lol.

For the points they can be quite devastating. They glance and wound on a 4+ (which really hurts MEQ armies). Thanks to the Deep Strike rule you can drop them in for a suicidal strike, or if you prefer hide them somewhere safe and rely on their jump ability and 4+ invulnerable save. They give the Daemons a much needed anti-tank punch.

You might ask "How many should I run, though?" The answer is simple; groups of three are very effective. The reason is flamers can't get any more than three templates off (Breathe of Chaos) on their first round of shooting. I suppose you could run more units, with one having Bolt of Tzeentch (30 points Range 24" Str 8 Ap1), though for the point cost I don't think it's worth it.

When Deep Striking you place the first unit (assuming they didn't mishap) then the second and third starting in a circle in the next row. That means the unit's bases are all touching one another. Adding a fourth model doesn't allow you to fire one of the templates without wounding your own units, which makes them less useful as a suicide unit. Granted, you can always run up to twelve, but if you want that many you may as well run a few squads of three instead. You'll get better results having more squads if you plan to drop them in as suicide units.

I got a good deal recently on a three pack of Flamers. It'll be nice to have the extra models (as I don't trust the pewter to stay together).

A couple coats of Flat White and they're ready for base coating. after a little touch up (I like to add a few watered down skull white layers to help reinforce the base coat) I'll start by adding a few coats of blue ink.

Once the wash dries I paint the flame areas with Iyanden Darksun base coat. It works great if you want to start a solid coat for yellow areas or in this case painting a flame. My only complaint about GW base paints is that they are pretty thick, so much so it's almost like painting with glue lol. I heard this is because they have such a high pigment (oink, jk). Still, a little water is all you need to keep it nice and smooth.

NEW! Blood Crushers

2010-10-05T13:45:00.000-07:00

After a recent trip to my local FLGS I picked up the new Blood Crushers box. They allow you to trade in good condition books for store credit. Luckily for me I had a few nice books laying around collecting dust, lol.

The new Blood Crushers are fantastic. Not only are they all plastic (woot!) but there are also some extra bits to customize them how you like. Very niiice!

Aside from being plastic, the models fit together very nicely. My biggest complaint for the old models was that the riders kept falling off. The new models, however, fit together in multiple places. This really helps keep them together. Also, plastic fuses together with super glue so you don't have to worry about them falling apart with normal wear and tear.

In the box you have the option of five different Blood Letter (rider) and Juggernaught (mount) heads. They also supply you with five round bases and square ones too.

The riders also have the option of wielding the standard Hellblade or a variety of other weapons. I decided on equipping them with the Icon of Chaos, The Herald's war gear, and a standard Hellblade.

I didn't use the Instrument of Chaos since I never play it. This upgrade allows you to win assaults resulting in a draw. In my experience with these guys they either win or lose in assault by no small margin making the instrument not worth the points.

The above pic you can see it overhanging the base quite a bit. It may hinder base to base contact somewhat, but hey it looks cool :P

This model needed a little pinning to keep it in place. After drilling the pilot holes I took a small piece of bronze rod and formed a "u" joint. A few nickels were then added to for counter balance.

Now I'm off to base them. More pics coming soon :)

Creed and Kell: Painting the Standard

2010-10-04T13:25:00.000-07:00

I inherited another commision, this time it's Creed and Kell for my friend's Cadian Imperial Guard. I've never painted a standard before so I was looking forward to the challenge.

Paints used -
Red areas: Mechrite Red.
Skin: Elf Flesh
Armor: Catachan Green
Cloth: Kommando Khaki
Boots: Codex Grey
Scrolls and Seals: Bleached Bone
Rope, belt, and gold area base: Scorched Brown
Metallic areas: Boltgun metal and Shining Gold

I started out with a white base coat. From here I painted what I was familiar with first, which was Kell's armor and effects.

You might notice the red area on the flag is a little lighter. I wanted to test how well it would coat and was pleased with the results. Mechrite red is a great foundation paint as long as it's thinned out a little bit (otherwise it's like painting with glue lol).

Slowly I worked in the chaos black to the banner. I took my time around the areas I wanted to remain white (like the aquilla).

Once the black was finished a little touch up was needed. I switched to a detail brush and carefully worked the edges. It helps to water the paints a little and keep the brush clean.

Filling in the other areas such as the sword hilt and wiring. Yellow was added to the search light and rope. The Standard lettering was based in mechrite red.

After a little more detail work the base is finished and ready for a wash.

Something I learned a while ago is to base any gold areas first with a brown base color. Gold is the only color that requires this in order to get a better effect.

Lava Board VI: Finished! (again)

2010-08-18T20:20:00.000-07:00

I lied before when I said it was finished. By finished I meant that I was done painting it for a while and needed a break.

One thing I noticed later on, and compared to other examples, was the lack of contrast in the lava to the surface. It sort of looked like a river of burning cheese, lol. A river of molten cheese sounds cool, but I'll have to try that later.

After going over the lava again with a heavy dry brushing of orange, I added in a little red to the mix and gradually worked up to solid red. It definitely brought a nice contrast to the board.

Once that dried a mix of 6:1 red/medium gray was dry brushed over the surface again. This was followed up with a little pure black over the tips of the lava. I planned on skipping black this time, but I think it adds to the texture.

What lava board would be complete without some chaos-worshiper's ruins? For fun I took some extra foam and melted a few "faces" in it with the hot glue gun.

Lava Board V: Finished!

2010-08-11T13:51:00.000-07:00

The Lava board is finished and ready for gaming! It took a few hours a day over the course of three weeks. Most of the time spent was gathering materials and changing the layout (I accidentally glued the wrong pieces down lmao). If I were to make this again, with what I've learned, it would probably take only a week with a majority of the time waiting for the caulking to cure.

This is the first bit of dry brushing. I used a bottle of gray rather than mixing black and white. I find it easier since you have the same exact color every time. I used a 3" brush over the surface areas and a 1 1/2" brush on the edges and lava channel.

A lot more dry brushing. After going over the surface and edges a few more times I added a little off white (bleached bone) to the mix and started dry brushing around the lava area. When the paint was nearly dried up I pressed firmly along the edges to exaggerate the shape of the cuts.

The board from a different angle. Here you can see the edging a little better. Notice the glow on the bridges? The terrain pieces were scrap from the lava areas. I'm planning to make more dynamic pieces later. Somebody asked about the wood bridge; it's actually for something else but it will do for now until I make a more appropriate one lol.

There you have it. A cheap and easy to make lava gaming board. Again I'd like to thank the original author for the inspiration. Had it not been for his great post I probably would have made a very basic board. I'm glad I took the time to make this and I can't wait to play test it!

A few things I'd like to add to his idea

The foam doesn't like to bond to adhesives. Be sure to prime it before bonding it.
Once the board is finished use a clear coat to seal it. This will help prevent wear-and-tear.
Blending the colors will add to the detail.
When painting try to paint like objects at the same time. I made the mistake of skipping a section and it was difficult to match it later.
Each 2x4 section used about 1 canister of adhesive and acrylic caulking for the lava. I recommend having 1 of each per section you make.
The biggest cost was the latex paint; it cost $22 at Home Depot. If you can get it cheaper this will cut your cost.
Subscribe to my blog! :P

From here I'm going to start building the area terrain and some taller sections. For the middle area I'm thinking of a making a floating Tzeentch fortress :)

If you decide to make your own I hope you found this tutorial helpful. :)

Lava Board IV: The Lava

2010-08-11T13:30:00.000-07:00

Now comes the fun part: Painting the lava! I did mine a little differently than the tutorial. The big difference is I didn't use red (since I ran out and was too lazy to go buy some). I used more orange and a little brown (8:1 orange and gray) which turned out pretty nice.

It's up to you want to paint the lava, though I recommend mixing between the primary colors otherwise it won't look very realistic. Blending the colors in stages may take a few more minutes but the end result is much better.

I used a 1 1/2" brush and painted a liberal amount of yellow to the channels. Once that dried I went back and heavily painted the edges. I found it worked best to pour the paint directly onto the board then dab it with the brush.

Next, some orange was heavily dry brushed over the yellow areas. When the brush is almost out of paint run some around the lower edges of the lava channel. This adds a nice glowing effect to the rocks.

Once the orange dried a little medium gray was added (8:1) which gave it a nice brownish tint. I started by lightly brushing over the high points then gradually applying more pressure. Notice the darker areas had more brown applied to them which gives the impression of the lava cooling faster.

Once that dried I added a little black to the mix and ran it over the tips of the lava. Finally just black was applied over the top. It helps to run the brush over the land area first then test it on a paper towel.

The next update will have completed pictures :)

Lava Board III: painting and texturing

2010-08-09T12:15:00.000-07:00

After three coats of Flat Black latex I let it sit for an evening. The next few coats were a mixture of Arena play sand and the same paint. I mixed them in a small plastic container until the paint had a slight texture to it.

The first texture coat was applied in long strokes to keep it consistent. I then went over it again with a thicker coat in the areas with less texture. The third coat was thicker still applied over the edges and random spots.

This may sound like a lot of work, but in fact the first one was almost dry when I got to the last section. I did them all together in an evening in front of the tv :)

The following day I loaded up the acrylic caulking and started pouring the lava. I found it easiest to make a smooth coat then pour another bead of caulking and layer on top of it. Also, it helped to add another bead around the edges and use a smaller brush to fill the gaps. This also helped keep the flimsier sections from peeling up.

For texturing I took a 3" brush (dry) and pulled the lava up. By moving it in certain directions it adds to the detail and continuity of the board. Like the original tutorial said, I took care to make the lava "flow" in a certain direction. Pressing the brush down firmly will make it look like the lava is flowing faster. Smaller vertical strokes makes the lava look like it's bubbling rapidy.

And what would a board be without some terrain pieces! For these I used the same glue for model basing and some fine sand over it. Once the board is finished I'll go back and make some more dynamic terrain :)

The Next update will be detail painting :)

Lava Board II: repeating a step : /

2010-08-08T11:00:00.000-07:00

Here's an update on the Lava Board project. Unfortunately the foam board didn't take to the MDF very well. With very little effort it peeled off. Not a big problem, lol, it just adds time to the process.

Taking some advice from a friend I painted the bottom of the board with a few thin coats of Flat Black. This took me about two episode's worth of the Office Season 5.

After the paint dried I repeated the gluing process. This time it took almost 3 cans of adhesive, but I didn't want to take any chances. Make sure to give the corners and edges a generous amount of glue.

Repeating the process I laid the boards on each other face down and put plenty of weight on them. I let them sit for 24 hours before touching them again. This time, fortunately, the boards held and it's off to the next step.

The next update will have the painting and texture process. :)

Lava Board 1: Building a Scheme

2010-07-23T13:15:00.000-07:00

There's a great tutorial on CoolMiniOrNot about making your own Lava board. I've been wanting to make my own for a while so I thought I'd follow his steps.

Here's a pic of his finished LAVA board!

What I like the most about his board is the added detail to terrain pieces. This, in my opinion, is what separates it from your run-of-the-mill gaming board. He also did a great job explaining the process and materials used.

Materials:
3/4" x Foam Board
Foam Cutter = $8, but we paid $4 from Michael's coupon
2x4 MDF boards = $2.18 a sheet from Home Depot
Locktite caulking x2 = $3 each. Already had a few of these.
Acrylic caulking x2 = $2-3 @ Walmart
Caulking Gun = $1 Again had this laying around
Hot Glue Gun (Optional) = $3 for gun + $7 for 100 sticks
Black Latex Paint = $1-10 @ Home Depot/Walmart
24oz paints = $1 from various craft stores.
Paint Brushes = $1 from dollar store
Batteries, D cell for foam cutter x2 = $5 (cost more than the cutter)

1) I started with a 4x8 foot sheet of foam and cut it into 2x4 sheets. Three sections are going to make up the board while the fourth piece may be another section or maybe for terrain pieces.

2) After a couple doodles I decided on a design and sketched it out. My only dilema, as a chaos daemon player, is having enough room to deep strike my units. Unlike the other board I opted to not make a volcano in the middle and instead added a lowered section of terrain.

3) Cutting the foam. Pretty straight forward. It's about as difficult as cutting butter with a warm knife. I moved the wire in a sawing motion to add some jagged edges to the lip.

4) Adding a little detail to the terrain. The 90 degree angle didn't look right for this board (maybe an ice board) so I wen't over it again at a 45 degree angle. This gave it much better detail.

5) I numbered the sections so I wouldn't forget where they went. Good thing too since I had a fun time trying to get them positioned correctly, lol.

6) With everything cut it was time to glue the board in place. I loaded the locktite multi-purpose adhesive (it's just what I had in the tool box) and got to work. Pretty straight forward, just pull the trigger and keep the glue about 1-2 inches from any edges. Keep a nice bead going and cover the board evenly.

7) The three sheets were stacked on a flat surface with the mdf board facing up. I placed plenty of weight over it and let it cure for 24 hours.

Waaagh Banner!

2010-07-07T11:51:00.001-07:00

With an Orky Bunker in the works I wanted to try my hand at some more Ork terrain. I've always wanted to make a tower with the Orky "laughing skull" on it. Also, why not make a 2nd floor for a Big Mek to stand and shoot.

Materials Used
(4)1/4" Dowels
22 gauge Floral Wire (aluminum wire)
Hot Glue Gun
DVD case (from a crappy movie)
cardboard
scrap foam board
(3) popsicle sticks
(20) Push Pins
Burlap strands
Misc Bits

Pretty simple. Four dowels glued together at the top, then wrapped with floral wire. Yeah I know my work area is a mess.

Jumping ahead a little... I took an old DVD case and cut the top and bottom parts of the face. The wall and floor surfaces area cardboard. Everything was glued into place with hot glue.

The top floor had to fit a Big Mek with S.A.G. I didn't have one available so I used a Dreadnaught's dimensions instead.

Next, scraps of foam board (from the Big Ead Bunka project) were cut and glued to look like support beams. Once that dried a few push-pins were added to give it that "riveted" look.

The 2nd floor needed a little more detail so I took a few strands of Burlap and wrapped them around the beams. Finally some misc bits here and there :)

The top smoke stack is some cotton glued to a gatorade cap. Originally I was going to make a Grot's nest up top, but it took up too much room and detracted from the face. Instead, I glued the smoke stack on and ran some cardboard around the edge.

After undercoating it black It was masked and spray painted section by section: Brown on the poles, Red on the Banner, and White on the face, grey on the smoke stack.

There you have it; a quick and easy Waaaaagh! Banner. I think I'll end up making four of these for Planet strike and use them as corner sections for walls.

Question: How do you make your rivets/bolts for your minis? Do you use pin heads or a different method? Any input is appreciated :)

Big 'Ead Bastion

2010-07-01T13:59:00.000-07:00

Kastle Waaaaaagh Skull!

If you're as old as me you probably remember the cartoon He-man. I always wondered how nobody figured out Prince Adam was also He-Man. I mean WTF? The look exactly the same and are the only two guys in land with the same Jim Carrey Bowl Cut! But I digress...

As our combined terrain has accumulated, I noticed a lack of anything Orky. I decided it was time to finally sit down and start making some Orky stuff. After skimming through some old White Dwarf magazines and terrain pics I came up with a game plan: an imperial weapon's cache that has since been taken over, stripped down, and rebuilt by the Orks. Ok maybe it's not completely original but it'll work :)

The idea was to make something big enough to hold LOTS of ork boyz. It also had to be tall enough that multiple groups could occupy it. Three stories came to mind. May as well make it look like a face!

The biggest challenge was making it look organic. I decided to build it in layers starting with the building walls, interior, then layering the Ork panels and so on.

It was time to salvage materials. I went through the house and stripped anything that wasn't nailed down. I might have over done it, though...nah you can never have too much scrap! What's the old saying? One man's trash is another man's treasure.

For the flooring I just cut popsicle sticks and glued them down breaking a few for good measure. The grating on the top floor are old soldering boards and the cables are made from stripped ethernet cables, tied down to eyelet crimp connectors.

I took the torch and started "Mean'in" it up. A couple holes here, a few burn marks there, and some misc battle damage

For the spikes I took old sprue pieces and carved them to a point. They work great since they are light but durable and aren't sharp. In fact, I brought this to a game last week (painted up) and my friend thought they were rusted nails lol.

to be continued...

Ok... I had to throw this in. This is a He-Man parody dubbed to the song What's Going on? by 4 Non Blondes. EPIC! haha. Watch the cook at the end, LMAO!

Blood Angels Command Squad

2010-06-10T13:54:00.000-07:00

I'm teaming up with a friend of mine for a 2v2 campaign. He plays Blood Angels which works great with my Khorne Daemons. We're thinking of the team name Blood Bath and Beyond lol. Fitting considering our armies are obsessed with the red stuff one way or another.

Seeing his army makes me want to ~~play~~ paint space marines again. I decided to convert the surviving members of the rag-tag marines into Blood Angels and sell them to my friend.

Kaching!

It's a pretty good deal for both of us since he gets fully painted Blood Angels with interchangeable weapons and I get the chance to paint them and earn some cash on the side.

I set out first on the Blood Angels Command Squad. The box set has some great options for weapon choices as well as much needed models for any Space Marines army. The thing that interested me the most were the options for heavy weapons such as the melta and plasma guns. Both are rare enough among SM players and it would be nice to swap them out on one model rather than trying to carve it into another one.

Originally I was going to magnetize the hands for the weapon swap. The problem is trying to seat the magnet properly. Luckily after a little manipulation both the plasma and melta guns fit nicely with just a pin in place.

The tricky part was lining up the left arm so it would hold both weapons. This guy came with two left hand grips which, I assume, the other was for the Bolter. I figured there's enough models out there with bolters (thanks to Black Reach) that this option wasn't necessary.

The Command squad is slowly getting there lol. As you probably noticed they were based different colors. I ran out of black so I switched to white instead. To be honest I prefer to base white if I can, but it tends to coat too "fuzzy" sometimes which makes priming smaller models a pain.

I use Krylon Flat white over their primer as it tends to coat a little better. One of these days I'll find the right white but until then I can settle with the $4 version lol.

Here's the Priest (Apothecary) almost done with the base coat. Now begins the slow process of layering thin coats of white. Once the white is finished 'll go back and clean up the seams with chaos black. The Armor is going to get a coat of watered down Blood Red followed by highlights with blazing orange. Still a lot to do but it will be worth it!

Blood for the ~~Blood God~~ Emperor!

BR: 8750 point escalaion game 4

2010-05-24T11:06:00.000-07:00

__________PROLOGUE__________

The smell was palpable. The stench of burning flesh assaulted his nostrals. Inquisitor Lord Haeron never liked the smell as it usually meant failure of the faithful. He had investigated his fair share of battle grounds in his day, but never anything like this.

Bodies upon bodies stacked as tall as a two story building in the eye of a crater nearly half a mile long. From what he could make out it seemed several forces had fought over that location to the death. Looking through his auspex scanner he could make out symbols and markings of at least seven different forces. among the crystalized remains were hints of imperial and astrates forces as well as those of various xeno and chaos factions.

There was no possible way to inspect the bodies in the central mass without risking contamination. He had sent scouting vhicles to traverse the ravine, but all attempts to get close to the carnage failed. Once the victims got close enough their heads exploding in a violent cloud of red mist. The flesh and blood of the fallen scouts crystalized instantly and fell slowly into the deep chasm below. Whatever was out there would not be recovered by conventional means. The hair on his arms rose as he could feel the slight surge of arcane energies spewing from the warp.

He clicked on his comm link underneath his collar.

"This is Haeron to Emperor's Light, do you read?"
"Yes Lord Inquisitor, we are standing by"
"We return shortly. Stand by to execute Exterminatus. ETA 10 minutes."
He did not wait for a reply before cutting the comm link. Next to him, the Grey Knight Sargent Kevalis, looking in his direction. The Space Marine understood all too well what had transpired here. He nodded in silent agreement.
"This planet is lost to the taint of Chaos" the inquisitor said "We shall send the faithful to be at the Emperor's side. This incident must never be spoken of."
"Indeed, my Lord" The Grey Knight replied.

__________Last Man Standing__________

8750 points
1275 each
7 armies
To the Death

Game 4 of our Escalation Campaign had a unique twist. We decided to play a seven way death-match. We added in our friend's Raven Guard since this isn't a point based game.

Rules:
Each player's turn rolled a D6 to determine which opponent they could attack. Clockwise 1 being his left and 6 being his right. He can then only shoot and assault that enemy. Any Assaults in progress involving his units are played as normal.

At the end of each turn the board drops off 5 inches from the deployment zone. Anything touching this is removed from the board. Units locked in melee continue normally despite the loss in numbers.

All of the HQs in the game are placed in the center. Their normal benefits apply, but they can neither attack or be attacked. Once a member of their army is in range of them (2 inches) they can be pulled out of the safe zone and into combat.

The entire army must remain in unit cohesion until the HQ is retrieved. Once that happens they act normally (as leadership has been restored).

A look at how the deployment was set up.

7 armies but only one would survive.

Here is half way through turn one. The IG took down a Raven Guard Rhino as the other forces moved towards their leaders.

The Blood Angels make their move. Roll a 6 they get the Nurgle Daemons as their target They manage to drop a Daemon prince and some Plague Bearers, but not before the Daemons take a few kills with them.

The Tally of Pestilence moves to 5, allowing Bearers to wound on a 3+

The beginning of turn two (about 1 1/2 hours later) lol. The Orks took out the Necron Destroyers. Things star getting cramped as more forces move towards the middle.

The Imperial Guard roll Daemons (WTF!) and drop some ordinance in their direction. Nurgle giggles as his followers avoid taking damage.

The Black Legion get the IG as their target. The evil commanders enter the battlefield and
do some damage destroying a Valkyrie, Heavy Weapons team, and some of the commander's retinue.

Now the Raven Guard react. Guess what, they roll a 1 and get Daemons (WTF!!) The Vindicator opens up on the Nurgling causing 4 wounds to the little bastards. In a bold move worthy of their legacy, Shrike leads the charge into assault.

The SternGuard lose two to a squad of plague bearers. Meanwhile Shrike assaults a near death Daemon Prince with his honor guard, but the deamon refuses to fall.

The Tally of Pestilence increases granting all followers of Nurgle Noxious Touch (wound on 2+)

Things get grim as many of the Guardsmen fall to the abyss. The IG get the Necron as their target and open up on the warriors.

Abaddon and his followers get to attack the Raven Guard. He manages to kill most of the marines and disable the main cannon of the Vindicator.

Moving forward a little bit, the Daemons retaliate against the remaining Raven Guard and add to the Tally once again. Amazingly, with one wound since round one, the Daemon prince finishes Shrike and his honor guard.

With nearly 20 deaths to the tally, all the nurgle forces with Feel No Pain roll a +3 making them harder to kill.

As the battle continued on the forces slowly started to diminsh until all that was left were the strongest of each army.

The Raven Guard were the first to fall as the Vindicator finally blew apart. Next came the Necron as Epidemus and his followers faorced the machines to faze out.

The Orks were down to the last Def Dread. The Daemon Prince with the single wound for most of the game finally fell as did the great Unclean one (I forgot he had 5 wounds but he was done I'm sure) leaving Epidemus and most of the Nurglings. The Def Dread charged the last of the nurgle forces. Unable to retaliate against the walking scrap heap Epidemus fell leaving the nurglings to fend for themselves.

Surviving most of the carnage Abaddon and his forces cleaned up what was left of the remaining forces and disappeared into the warp. No one survived to tell the tale of what transpired.

__________EPILOGUE__________

A long battle indeed. It started about 2pm and ended at 9pm, lol. Needless to say we were all done playing for the day, but it was a fun experience. Everyone survived to the very end which is always cool.

The randomness of who you attack and the table dropping made the battle a bit more random. The smaller armies had the advantage in later rounds as they could avoid more casualties from the natural disaster.

Daemon of the Game: would have to be the Daemon Prince that survived the entire game with 1 wound left. The three he took early on were from IG shooting. He managed to take out Shrike, his Honor Guard, a squad of thousand sons and (then some), and most of the remaining Necron warriors. This was mostly due to the Tally of Pestilence strengthening the nurgle forces.

There is one game left in the campaign. It's a 1v1 1500 point game. The last army to face will be the Necron. Commander Kyle surprised me before as I lost to him @ 750. I underestimated the strength of his Necron and it cost me a tie by 5 points! Now it's payback and with the Tally of Pestilence the Nurgle stand a much better chance at victory.

Buh-bai Ultra Smurfs :(

2010-05-21T13:15:00.000-07:00

It's a sad day for the Ultra Marines. The last of my remaining forces have been reassigned to the Blood Angels. I recently sold them to "Commander Mike" who will turn them into Death Company. I kept them as they were my first army, but alas the time has come to strip the paint and start fresh.

One last look before they hit the dip tank. Goodbye my brothers, you won't be forgotten (especially your losing streak).

New Daemons in August? Time to save!

2010-05-20T11:37:00.000-07:00

Sunday night, about 1130pm, I recieved a nice surprise! I was winding down doing the normal winding down stuff like drinking Red Bull and doing push-ups when I decided to check my mail. Games Workshop sent out a news letter stating "Demons in August, give us all your money!" Who am I to refuse such a profound statement? New Chaos Daemons coming in August? I guess I'll push back my Warstore order.

My Blood Crushers are primed and ready for painting. I only have the three so far, but I'll have to put off getting any more until GW reveals what the new models are. Plastic Blood Crushers would be amazing, but I doubt it. Rumors say a plastic Daemon Prince and troop choices are coming. Meh, who can say what comes out, but if they do put out any pewter replacements I'd be happy. Once they release the models I'll have to put in my order which will probably complete the Daemons army (lol yeah right).

BIG Daemon Prince WiP: pt 3

2010-05-08T15:35:00.000-07:00

Here are a few more pics of the big beast!

I put a generous amount of Scorched Earth on the darker green areas of the armor. The spikes on the shoulder were also dry brushed with the same color.

I went over the skin with a little bit of bealched Bone followed by Desert Yellow. This gave it a little more of a diseased look. Once that dried I mixed 2:1 Gloss Medium with Scorpion Green and went over the skin and armor.

Once everything dried again I added a little skull white to the mix to lighten up the green areas. You can see this on the tips of the claw above.

The shoulder armor was dotted with the 2:1 mix a few coats. I then went over the hard lines with the lighter 4:2:1 (Gloss Medium:Scorpion Green:Skull White)

Aside from the wings, all that's left is the base and lower legs. The banner hanging down I decided to paint as rotting flesh instead of cloth. I think blending it from the current skin tones to a dark brown would draw attention to it and off set a lot of the green a little.

The base itself I might change to lava. originally I was going to make it look like toxic waste, but now having more green might drown the model out too much. The lava might be a nice offset the other colors.

BIG Daemon Prince WiP: pt 2

2010-05-06T13:45:00.000-07:00

Primed

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Here's a size comparison next to the Blood Thirster. As you can see he's HUGE lol. I plan on using him as an Apocalypse HQ in the future, but for now he'll fill the role of Daemon Prince

The Daemon Prince stands a little over 6 inches w/o wings and about 11 inches with them on. So much for hiding out of Line of Sight, lol.

Basecoats

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The skin I used GW Tallarn Flesh foundation, the red areas are Mechrite Red foundation, Catachan on the green spots, and Kommando Khaki on the bone and claw areas.

The gold areas started out with a few coats of burnished Gold. I put on a few thin coats to get it to cover evenly. Normally I'd undercoat it with a brown or similar color, but it's not too important since most of it will be covered up.

Washed

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The skin I washed with Ogryn Flesh. Once that started to dry I applied Baal red over the exposed red areas, letting a little run over onto the skin to make it blend a little.

The rest of the model I washed with good ol' Devlin mud. The "ooze" on the base was given a light coat of Dark Angels Green which bled onto the rock (bark area) which was based Codex Grey. Once that dried I did over the base and metal areas again with Devlin Mud.

Detailing

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I started out by dabbing boltgun metal on all the golden areas. Once that dried I applied a thin amount of Scorched Earth on all the metal areas to give it a more tarnished look.

Scorched Earth was also applied on the edges where the torn flesh areas meet. This gives the illusion of blood clotting.

The chaos piece on his back armor plate shows how the tarnished look is turning out. The brown really adds a nice muted tone to the metal making it look worn down.

Right now he looks far too healthy to be an engine of pestilence and decay. Since he is a Nurgle Daemon Prince, he will soon get a nasty skin overhaul. All the skin areas will get a light green and yellow tint using glazes. The claws I plan to have bright green tips to represent noxious touch.

The tabbard hanging down, originally, was going to be painted a whitish/yellow color with the death guard symbol. I later decided I'm going to paint it flash colors as well, but have it blend to the tip to look more like dead skin. The Nurgle symbol I will try to make it look like it's been stitched on.

BIG Daemon Prince WiP: pt 1

2010-04-27T15:43:00.001-07:00

Work continued on the Daemon Prince. The hardest part was going to be designing the legs. Originally I thought of making hooves or a snake like lower body, but that seems to be used too often with daemons. After reading through a post on From the Warp: Making Plasticard Plates that gave me the idea of making terminator legs instead.

After some sketches and browsing through some pics I thought I'd give it a shot. The most time consuming part was making the shape of the boots fit with the body. A few times it looked like he was wearing leg warmers. Yeah nothing says "intimidation" like leg warmers.

I decided to make the Daemon Prince's look more like termie legs. Originally I was thinking of Hooves, but almost all the tuorials I saw had the same style of legs so I wanted to be different.

After sculpting the boots (which remind me an awful lot like Mega Man's lol) I stretched a thin amount of GS over the thigh areas.

I followed the same process over the boot area. This will help bond the glue to the plasticard better.

The reason I made him so big is because he is a Heavy choices in the Chaos Daemon codex, unlike the Chaos Space Marine's counterpart being an HQ instead

While that cured I got to work on the shin armor plates. I had some 3x5 cards lying around and made a template. Let's see how it fits....

As you can see it's a little too big. It almost looks like he's wearing soccer shin guards, lol. Nothing a pair of scissors can't fix.

After cutting the stencil down a bit I traced the image onto a sheet of plasticard.

The upper leg plating was a bit easier. All that had to be done was cut a strip of plastic card and bind it to help with the bend.

I started the process by gluing the inner part and holding in shape for a few minutes.

After 15 minutes I glued the rest in place around the leg.

The shin plates were glued in the middle then folded back. After this comes my favorite part; playing with the hot glue again. The hot glue gun is great for making quick drying texture. Although it doesn't hold shape like clay does, it can be heated and re-sculpted easily so it's very effective for this sort of thing.

EITMC week I: Round 2

2010-04-19T10:56:00.000-07:00

Escalation in the Man Cave round 2: 500 points 1-on-1

Here are the results of the second round of the Campaign. This time it's the forces of Nurgle vs. the Necron.
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Chaos Daemons of Nurgle:
8 Plague Bearers w/ Icon (team A)
7 Plague Bearers (team B)
9 Nurglings (team B)
1 Bight Drone (team A)

Special Rules: All but the BD have +5 inv. sv. and FnP. Blight Drone is a fast/skimmer and treats it's own destroyed - wrecked as destroyed - explosion.

The Necron:
1 Lord +Res Orb
10 Warriors
3 Destroyers

Special Rules: Necrons can resurrect on a 4+ the controlling player's next turn. Lord equipped with Scythe that can ignore invulnerable saves.
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Round 1 Necron: He won the initiative and decided to go first. The Warrior and retinue moved to the left flank and the dstroyers to the right.

Round 1 Nurgle: Again praying to the dice gods I was denyed the 3+ I needed and deployed team B instead. The Nurglings and Plague Bearers landed on target and ran to cover ending my turn.
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Round 2 Necron: The Destroyers moved 12" to the right flank to gain line of sight on the Plague Bearers and opened fire. The PB made their saves. The Warriors, wanting to remain out of assault range, fired 10 shots into the nurglings but were also denied any kills.

Round 2 Nurgle: Again needing 4+ to bring in reserves the gods granted my wish as Team A now came on the board. Again the Bight drone deviated the same direction barely missing the Nurglings in cover. The other Plague Bearers landed on target and ran to join their brethren.

The Blight Drone opened up first with Phlegm with a direct hit causing 4 Necrons to burt apart. The Reaper Cannons failed to penetrate.
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Round 3 Necron: Kyle rolled his We'll be back roll, but all the damaged Necron failed to stand. His Destroyers moved further to the right flank and opened up on the Bligh Drone, causing a shaken result and denying it the chance to shoot again next turn.

The Lord and his retinue moved further back into cover and fired again into the swarm of nurglings, but again we're denied any wounds thanks to a 3+ swarm cover save and 4+ FnP.

Round 3 Nurgle: With the Blight Drone unable to attack he retreated to the farthest back left corner. He faced towards the right side of the table to deny any side hits. With any luck the destroyers would flank the left side instead which would bring them into assault range of the two PB squads hiding behind the middle pillar.

The Nurglings and Plague Bearers made their move and ran towards the Lord and his retinue. Still out of assault range they managed to keep themselves partially behind cover to soak up some more potential damage.
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Round 4 Necron: The Warriors remained where they were and opened up on the Nurglings. This time they were rewarded with 4 unsaved wounds scoring a kill for the Necron and the first of the game.

The Destroyers moved to flank the Blight drone and managed to score one penetrating shot, destroying the drone with a roll of 5. Out of assault range he ended his turn.

Round 4 Nurgle: The Nurglings managed to close the gap and got into assault with the Lord and his warriors. The Plague Bearers, on the other hand, rolled poorly on their slow-and-purposeful roll and we're slightly out of range of assaulting the destroyers.

The Lord went first and with four attacks causing 3 wounds to the Nurglings. Another squad of Nurglings went down. During their counter attack they caused 1 wound to the lord and one more death to the warriors.
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Round 5 Necron: Realizing his Destroyers were about to be assaulted he moved them as far away as possible and opened up on the plague bearers, but again was denied any wounds.

The assault continued as the lord managed to score another 2 wounds and the Nurglings, with their poor WS, finding it difficult to land anything at all.

Round 5 Nurgle: This time all the Plague Bearers were in range and joined the assault. Again the lord attacked with his scythe, this time to the plague bearers causing one more kill point. The warriors and nurgle forces exchanged blows leaving 3 necron dead and another plague bearer the same.
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a 4 is rolled and it continues to turn 6

Round 6 Necron:
With nothing to target his destroyers join the fray as all models are now tied ino the same assault.

At this point it's the same result throughout. The Necron Lord causes another death as do the plague bearers, but this time all previously killed warriors get back up, denying any kill points from the previous round.

Round 6 Nurgle: Now with the Destroyers in assault everyone focuses their attacks on them, as they are worth more in kill points than the warriors. Two Destroyers are taken down as the Nurglings take another wound.
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a 6 is rolled and it continues to turn 7

Round 7 Necron: The final turn of the game. One of the two Destroyers gets back up, leaving two still alive and most of the warriors intact. Attacks are exchanged again as the lord kills another plague bearer. The forces of Nurgle strike back killing a warrior and the remaining destroyers.

Round 7 Nurgle: With the Destroyers out all attacks are focused on the warriors. Although the Lord is worth more points, he has managed to shake off all but one wound the entire game. Killing warriors would up the kp tally a little, making it a close game.
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The game ends with the Necron scoring 205 points and Nurgle with 150. Denied the kill points of the warriors (since they were just over 50% strength) put the Necron over the top. The Nurgle lost by 5 points lol

Summary: This was a pretty close game. The changing factor was that the Lord was carrying a scythe that ignored invulnerable saves. This denied the Nurgle forces unsaved wounds. Every round the Lord was putting up about 1 kill, but it was enough to edge them to victory.

This was a fun experiment running mostly nurgle troops. They managed to soak up a lot of damage, though due to the low ws and str. made it hard for them to kill anything without support. They are great at tar pitting strong enemies until your stronger units can join in to the fray.

EITMC week I: 500pts 1v1

2010-04-18T15:25:00.000-07:00

Escalation in the Man Cave round 1: 500 points 1-on-1

Here are the results of the first round of the Campaign.
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Chaos Daemons of Nurgle:
8 Plague Bearers w/ Icon (team A)
7 Plague Bearers (team B)
9 Nurglings (team B)
1 Bight Drone (team A)

Special Rules: All but the BD have +5 inv. sv. and FnP. Blight Drone is a fast/skimmer and treats it's own destroyed - wrecked as destroyed - explosion.

Orkz:
3 Killa Kanz
3 Killa Kanz
10 Boyz squad +Boss Pole
1 Big Mek +Kustom Force Field

Special Rules: Kanz are walkers with AV 11F/11S/10R and the Big Mek's shield gives any units within 6" a 4+ cover save.
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My plan was to tie up his boyz to get enough kills to force a draw. The Blight Drone was there to try and pick off some Killa Kanz.

Round 1 Orkz: I won initiative so I decided to go 2nd. The Orks proceeded to move towards the middle of the board. With nothing to shoot they decided to run then ended their turn.

Round 1 Nurgle: Praying for a 3+ to bring in team A, the dice gods favored me with a 5. Placing the Blight drone safely in the back center of the field was a good decision as he deviated 11" to the left side. He shot his Phlegm large Blast but it deviated completely off target. With his twin linked Reaper Auto Cannon he scored two hits, but failed to penetrate any armor. The 8 Plague Bearers squad fared better with no deviation. The PB squad ran to the back left side to try and find cover.
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Round 2 Orkz: The Orkz moved forward and began shooting. The 3 on the right opened up and scored 15 hits from 6 small blast templates on the Plague Bearers. All but one managed to make his save resulting in 1 KP for the Orkz. The other 3 Kanz focused on the Blight drone and ended up destroying the Maw-cannon taking out the Large Blast Weapon. Still out of range the remaining Orkz ran and ended the turn.

Round 2 Nurgle: Needing a 4+ to bring in reserves, the dice gods agreed granting both remaining squads the 4s they needed. The Plague Bearers and Nurglings in reserve were placed safely withing 6" of the Icon. The two squads that came in couldn't do anything more so they sat and waited as the team A moved forward 6" towards the Boyz squad. The Blight drone moved laterally to the far corner behind the other troops and shot his Reaper Cannons at the other 3 Killa Kanz, but again failed to do any damage.

With shooting complete the 8 Plague Bearers ran into assault against the only Boyz squad denying them the furious charge. One Plague Bearer fell from combat as two boyz died in the melee. Rolling for fearless they made their saves and round two ended
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Round 3 Orkz: The Kanz began to move away from the remaining nurgling forces, but then decided against it and pushed forward another 6". They unloaded 6 small blast againt the Nurglings resulting in two wounds.Being a swarm the wounds doubled making the total, killing off 1 swarmling and giving another a wound. The other 3 Kanz shot into the Plague Bearers, but thanks to their 5+ inv and FnP they avoided taking any wounds.

Assault: 3 Kanz assaulted the 9 nurglings, while the other 3 Kanz assaulted the other 7 Plague Bearers. Since the nurgle units have such low strength, none were able to penetrate a walker's front armor, so they did not attack. Due to the Kanz having Dreadnaught CCW they denied any forces a FnP save. The asaults ended with another nurgling and plague bearer failing their 5+ inv saves.

Meanwhile the Boyz and PB continued assault. Both sides trading attacks at the same time. This time the Plague Bearers took 3 Boyz down while losing 1 themselves. The Orkz rallied and avoided a sweeping advance.

Round 3 Nurgle: Unable to do anything the nurglings and PB of team B took additional wounds. The Blight Drone with nothing to shoot at moved to the other half of the board in attempt to set up some shots, knowing the nurgle forces tied up wouldn't last long.

Failing their saves the 8 plague bearers are wiped out and the Orkz move towards the Blight Drone for an assault.
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Round 4 Orkz: Unable to return attacks and denied FnP, the Nurglings and PB of team B continued to take losses. At this point the best they could hope for was tie up the Kanz long enough to force a draw.

The Boyz move into assault to the Blight drone. The Nob scores a penetrating hit with his klaw and destroys the drone. They consolidate towards the remaining assaults.

Round 4 Nurgle: The remaining Plague Bearers are wiped out and the 3 Kanz move towards the last squad of nurglings.

The Boyz dropped a few more plague bearers making the kill count 5 of 8 now. The Plague Bearers answered with another kill, and managed to make their fearless rolls to avoid any more casualties.
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Round 5 Orkz: All remaining Ork forces converge on the remaining Nurglings. The additional wounds done are by the power weapons. More casualties and wounds are added.

Round 5 Nurglings: The Nurglings attack the boyz but fail to do any damage as they continue to take losses.
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a 4 is rolled and it continues 1 more round

Round 6: The Orkz manage to kill the last of the Nurglings
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Result: Nurgle loss

Summary: I knew ahead of time that the Orkz were using the Kanz and hoped not to play them, but fate can be a bitch sometimes. The best chance I had was to force a draw by killing the Boyz and Big Mek and maybe a Kan or two.

Although I was lucky with deployment, the combination of low weapon skills, lack of strength, and some bad rolls almost guaranteed a loss. Still, I came into round one knowing this so it's all good.

Scratch built Blight Drone I

2010-04-18T13:17:00.000-07:00

For the upcoming campaign I wanted to try something new so I decided to try my hand at scratch building a Blight drone. This model is a based off of the Forge Model normally used for Apocalypse games (in greater numbers of course). Looking through a lot of Death Guard and all Nurgle lists and noticed a lot of people fielding these.

This model was built based off a few different tutorials. The one I found most helpful was Animerik's at the Papa Nurgle forums. He really does a nice job of modeling and explaining the steps. If you're interested in making one of these please check his tutorial as it's pretty detailed :)

Every model I build I try to use the cheapest or common materials I can find.

Tools used:

Tin Foil
12 gauge planting wire
Hobby knife
clay sculpting tools
never dry modeling clay
air dry modeling clay
green stuff epoxy
Plastic card
3/8" solid rod
Hot glue gun
Soldering iron
and anything else laying around :)

Total material cost: about $15. Not bad considering the plastic card and green stuff would be the majority cost. They could be replaced with cheaper alternatives, but I suppose it's opportunity cost at that point; spend a little more for better quality materials and save time in the long run. Still, $15 is decent considering the original FW model costs over five times that amount.

I was lazy this time, so I didn't take pictures of the process, but for the most part it's identical to the tutorial up to the assembly point. The only big difference is I twisted 12 gauge wire to make the ties and such.

The problem with this model is all the modeling clay was making it tough to keep it mounted. The cheap clay I used underneath was too soft to glue the rod to and the GS had to much flex to keep the model in place.

The solution was to break out the soldering iron and melt some plastic to the model. It cools fast and creates a rock solid surface to work with. I melted plastic up the base to the bodem of the Blight Drone. After that I used hot glue to texture the model and tie everything together (and more importantly hide mistakes lol).

I used a black primer then gave it a light amount of brown followed by a dark green over that.

I started adding boltgun to the metal areas like the cables and gun components and Goblin Green to the slime areas.

I'm satisfied for the results, especially since it was finished before the Campaign. The hardest thing about this model was getting the cheap air-dry clay to stay in place so I could tie in the GS over it. It worked out, but if I were to make another one of these I would probably try a better alternative.

It may not look like it, but there was very little GS used. I stretched it out as much as possible to cover just the top layer and add a stronger surface to detail. To put it in perspective, I could use a full $15 tube of Green Stuff to make three of these and still have some left. That's not bad considering that these models are $75 a piece from Forge World!

Escalation list for Week 1

2010-04-14T16:15:00.000-07:00

My lists for the upcoming Escalation campaign. I decided to drop Khorne and go all Nurgle instead.

500 points
8 Plague Bearers +Icon = 145 pts
7 Plague Bearers = 105 pts
9 Nurglings = 117 pts
1 Blight Drone 12F 11S 10R = 125pts
Total: 492 points

750 points
Epidemus = 110
8 Plague Bearers +Chaos Icon = 145 pts
7 Plague Bearers = 105 pts
9 Nurglings = 117 pts
1 Blight Drone 12F 11S 10R = 125pts
Daemon Prince: MoN, IH, CoF = 145
Total: 747 points

I had to drop Daemonic Gaze from the Daemon Prince. It was between that or Iron Hide, but the 3+ save is too good to pass up imo.

These lists aren't very powerful, but the following week I can start beefing up the DP a little more and add another HQ. We're playing to 1500 so I'm hoping in the later weeks to fully unleash the power of Nurgle, mwa ha ha.

Scratch built DP WiP

2010-04-11T09:28:00.000-07:00

Recently my buddy over at WH40k by S2ua7 gave me some IG and Nid bits to play with. WooT! I was going to use them as accessories for my other Soul Grinder, but then I came up with this idea.

I need another Daemon Prince and at $35 each (pewter too) it's a little steep. This one started to come together over the course of a few hours.

The head is from the GUO kit, horns from KoS alt head, and other than the chest armor, most of the model is kit bashed from a Soul Grinder kit.

I have another matching claw which I'm thinking of using on the other arm (the melted gun was just a fun experiment lol). The legs are going to be filled out and armor plated. Once that's done I'm going to model a SM backpack and have the wings "tearing" out of the top vents.

Still a lot to work on, but I'm pleased with the results so far.

LoC fire molding

2010-04-09T08:43:00.000-07:00

Here are the recent poll results...

What tutorials do you enjoy the most?

Painting Techniques	3 (33%)
Green Stuff/Sculpting	4 (44%)
Model Customization	7 (77%)
Terrain Making	4 (44%)
Other...	1 (11%)

The polls are in with 77% of us preferring to read about Model Customization posts. Green Stuff/Sculpting and Terrain Making are tied at second. I couldn't agree more. I find customized models to be the coolest thing about the hobby.

With that said I'm going to post more model customizing. I just did a lot of kit bashing and can't wait to finish this model. It's turning out really cool :)

Here's a few quick pics of the LoC so far. I decided to stop using GS for the flames and instead am going to try melting plastic instead. I like this method a lot more since it's much faster and you can remodel it instantly if you don't like the shape.

Plague Bearers Conversion pt II

2010-04-09T08:00:00.000-07:00

The hot glue adds some nice mass to the model, but it's hard to detail since it doesn't hold any shape. Normally I would just do that and call it good, but it wouldn't make for good reading.

Digging around my electrical tools I had an idea... The soldering Iron! If you haven't used one before they are quite simply a low voltage tool to melt soft metals to create a bonding material for electrical components. For us real men, they are great for burning shit too!

With that said if you decide to use a soldering iron be very careful not to burn yourself. They get extremely hot and can burn you severely. I strongly suggest only plugging it in when you will use it then immediately unplug it when you are done. Speaking from experience I've burned enough things (like carpets) I wish I hadn't haha.

I apologize for the bad pun...

The two prong pitch fork and the torch to the right of it are the same bit. Initially I wasn't trying to make a torch, but these things just happen sometimes, lol.

The box was a little short on swords so I had to improvise a little. The ones above were mostly "bones" from the kit.

After heating up the soldering iron I melted the models carefully. I applied the iron much like a paint brush.

This model has a little work done to the eyes and torso. I decided to, if possible, keep the jaw details and just carve the eye into a cyclops.

Here I was experimenting with adding bullet holes and "battle damage" to the model. The other ones I have claw marks and spilling guts.

Another Plague Bearer.

This sword was a Gene Stealer claw. I wish I had more of these as they were fun to detail.

Nurgle Standard Bearer. I'll probably add something to the standard to make it look more convincing.

Both models here have the same weapon, though the one on the right has had the iron put to it.

They're starting to look a little more Nurglish. The next step will be the hot glue gun to the horns to bulk them out a bit. I'm still debating on if the bodies should get hot glue since it doesn't mold very easily and doesn't hold detailed shapes.

Plague Bearers Conversion pt I

2010-04-08T14:02:00.000-07:00

Looking over my army I realized I am lacking in troop choices. I have plenty of Blood Letters (thanks to them being plastic now) but I only had 5 of the other types. At the price of $25-30 for 5 models (ouch) and the fact that you need to field lots and lots to be effective I decided to find a cheaper alternative (not to mention an excuse to tear something apart WOOT).

After digging through various catalogs I came to find the Vampire Count's Zombie Horde set; 20 models for $30. Best of all, they're all plastic! I went to my local game store and to my surprise they had one box left (though I'm sure he's lying as usual but meh...the tangled webs we weave). Anyway, I got to work right away with the new vigor of having something to kit bash! Plastic for the Plastic God!

Plague Bearers need to have two things

Cyclops - they all (usually) have just one eye @__x
headgear - No I'm not talking about the wrestling kind...more of a slimy horn sticking out of their heads.

With that in mind I got to work...

One thing I needed was more swords. I took the three scythes that came in the box and removed the blades. The left hands had a good hilt on the instrument hands, so I cut and pinned them in place.

So far so good. They have other weapons available like bones clubs, but I wanted to keep it WYSIWYG. The guy on the left has both a Plague sword and instrument of chaos now (notice the foot he's holding haha).

Next I drilled a small pilot hole in each of their mugs...

...and gave them a brass rod lobotomy. I was tempted to keep it this length, but it might make fielding a hassle.

Next step I wanted to try some cheap texturing. Sure, you can Green Stuff, but I wanted something faster and easier than that. It would defeat the purpose of making a cheap model if you have to invest more expensive materials.

I broke out the hot glue gun and gave the test model a glue bath.

It turned out pretty neat so far. The only question is if I'll be able to add detail to the glue areas or not.

The green models are the original Pewter models. Five of those are the same price as twenty of the ones I made. Not a bad deal!

I like 'em so far. I'll have more pics up pretty soon.

Nurgle - GUO III

2010-04-06T21:10:00.000-07:00

Added some Blood red and a little red ink to the open sores and eyes. It really adds a nice disgusting contrast to the model haha.

I went over the sores again with Titilating Pink. The skin I started to highlight with a 2:1 mix of Kommando Khaki and Desert Yellow. The horns and nails I used the same mix then coated with Devlin Mud.

Once the highlights are done I'm going to dry brush the model again and then start on some glazes.

Nurgle - GUO II

2010-04-05T00:41:00.000-07:00

A quick update to the Great Unclean One. He's been fun to paint so far and I look forward to detailing this big disgusting guy. For the most part I know how I want to paint the body, but I'm still debating on how to do his sword and chains. I want them to look rusted yet contrast against the GUO's skin tone.

I gave the green areas a wash and painted the teeth with Kommando Khaki

Next a dry brush graveyard earth. If you're not familiar with dry brushing, it's a technique that involves lightly "dusting" the model with a little bit of paint (about 10% of what you normally use). This helps add some artificial highlighting not to mention a pretty cool effect.

The only drawback to this technique is it can leave your surface "fuzzy" and can be more prominent the lighter the pigment color. An alternative to dry brushing is wet blending, which is more advanced but yields better results.

Finally I went over the model again with another wash, this time Devlin Mud. As any mini painter can tell you washes are great. They really bring out the contrast in a model. Comparing this to the previous picture you can see how the contrast has changed. Washes also help transition colors together more smoothly.

These are some fairly basic yet effective tools in bringing out a model's details. From my personal experience, learning how to apply just these two techniques has helped me tremendously. It has helped train my eyes to recognize some subtle details that I used to over look.

Nurgle - GUO I

2010-04-02T20:14:00.000-07:00

EDIT: Oh yeah. Please vote on the poll to the right! Pick one (or as many) that you agree with. I want to know what kind of tutorials you like to read the most for hobbying.

Me personally, I like it when somebody makes a home made model out of the most unlikely of things, so I vote model customization.

Thanks for your input
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Hey my fellow bitheads! Been busy working on my army for the up-n-coming Campaign.

I figured it's a good time to get as much done as possible (at least basecoated). For me the most difficult part of modeling is getting it to the basing coat. I like to have seams clean and bases based. From then on I think it's easier since they can be table top quickly and detailed atat your own leisure.

With that said have a look at my latest wip: Great Unclean One

One problem I ran into on this guy is his chain (dragging on the ground) didn't pin right. It sits below the model. I didn't want to have to re pin and all that so I decided to raise him up a little. I put Green Stuff on the gaps of the chain to cover where the model doesn't join properly.

Step II: Base coat

I was debating on the base coat. Originally I was going to do white and work up, but I felt it was unnecessary. I decided to go with gray and I think it turned out pretty good. Notice the little dead Space Marine O___O

Step III: Adding in some Green

The first coat is Goblin Green. I'm hitting all the GS areas while trying to avoid the recesses on the body. Once that is finished I'll use a green wash and then onto the next color.

More pics coming soon

Tutorials and campaign rules

2010-03-29T22:41:00.000-07:00

I'm currently working on updating the Escilation campaign rules and if I have time I'll make a pdf for it. You can find the rules to the right. The big challenge is trying to implament a fair and balanced point system. This will allow people who play and participate more often more points, yet still allow those who aren't there as much to still have a fighting chance.

As for tutorials I have Blood Angels speed painting almost finished and some more pinning guides. I also have two troop conversions in the works I think you'll enjoy.

KoS - pinning and GS

2010-03-21T09:25:00.000-07:00

Working with pewter has been a learning experience. One thing I learned is don't try to take shortcuts if you want your models to stay in one piece lol.

With that said I invested some time researching different pinning techniques. One thing I learnes is a pin vice is much better for pilot hole drilling than a multi-speed dremel on low setting. It's made the drilling process ten times easier and faster (not to mention the model isn't getting hot from friction anymore).

Tools used

Hobby knife
Super glue
Pin Vice (hand drill)
wire brush
small clippers
metal push pins
Green Stuff epoxy

Out of all my models this guy has been quite a p.i.t.a. lol. He refuses to stay glued and is fairly unstable. A little pinning will fix that right up :)

The claw arms have already been pinned so now it's on to the more difficult ones. The slight problem with his sword arm is it's set at a weird angle and pushes against his head lol. I started by drilling a small pilot hole with the pin vice and then gluing the pin in place.

I drilled the hole and marked it around a quarter inch. I just need it to be deep enough to join the pieces without weakening it's structural integrity.

A dry fit. These small push pins are great since they are very stiff and gives you something to hold on to. Depending on the model I'll keep the point on and wedge it into a model creating a very snug fit.

For this arm, though, I cut of the tip to keep it flush.

Once the glue dried I cut the pin head off

This is the original pose of the hand. He's doing a "bang-you're-dead" or something. Meh, it's alright, but I think it would look cooler to rotate the wrist and make it look like he's taunting his prey.

Dry fit in place. The wrist has a slight bend which I think adds a little to the theme of the model.

With the glue almost dry I worked some Green Stuff into the wrist. This helped to keep it firmly in place

That's better. A little green stuff goes a long way

With everything in place I ran a hole through the shoulder.

Finally a dry fit for the arm. It fit nicely and just needs a little gs to clean it all up.

There you have it. Pretty simple yet very effective. I finished up pinning all the arms and all that's left is some simple basing then priming.

Chaos Daemons page added

2010-03-20T12:26:00.000-07:00

Another quick update. I added a side banner for my Chaos Daemons army. Right now it's pretty simple, but I will ~~over complicate~~ expand on it soon.

The page will feature an image gallery, progression, story lines, and..well..anything relating to them lol.

EITMC update

2010-03-19T13:51:00.000-07:00

Armies FAQ Pictures Rules Schedules

I added a side banner to help navigate through this section. Eventually I'll have a new site banner up, but I'm too ~~lazy~~ busy :)

Also, I'll start building up army pages for myself and friends participating in the EITMC. Any suggestions/comments are very appreciated

Creed n Kell primed

2010-03-18T21:28:00.000-07:00

We're starting an escalation League here soon and it sounds pretty fun. I haven't participated in one before, but to my understanding we start at a low point army and add to it every week. This gives us a good reason to start painting a 2000 point army. With the majority of us new to escalation it'll be a little flexible this time as to WYSIWYG and probably at least table top quality on our armies.

As for my army, the Chaos Daemons are going along nicely. I've been focusing on getting the HQs cleaned up and ready for priming. This may sound fairly simple, but I assure you it's been a rather tedious process. All the models, aside from being pewter, are not cooperating in the assemble stage and required a little pinning and gap filling. It's been a slow process, but I enjoy it and it's turning out better than I expected. I'll do another post about each HQ.

The Emperor's Champion

Originally I was going to make him part of a scenery piece, but I decided on painting him instead. He's just to cool a figure to be a statue lol. I'm debating on the color scheme, though, since I'm trying to make a TinBitz themed army.

Creed and Kell

Started on these guys for a friend of mine. They each have great detail and I'm looking forward to painting them. I was going to put Kell (standard bearer) on a platform as well but decided against it. I think it will look better to have Creed showing off his pose elevated a bit while Kell gets a normal scenic base.

Soul Grinder 5: OSL (2)

2010-02-22T14:05:00.000-08:00

The OST (Object Source Lighting) was turning out nicely, but I felt it needed more. After digging through many tutorials and such, I felt I should add more to the model. Here are the results.

I went back over the slightly glowing areas with Ultra Marines blue again. This time I took a little more care in trying to get over the model more. After that I worked a few layers up to Ice blue to a little skull white.

The plan from here is to get everything else finished on the body then go back and add some more OSL in the areas that need it like the sword arm. Once I get that done the model will be nearly done.

I might not play this guy in anything but tournaments depending on how it turns out. My plan is to use the other SG body in games until I finish my Nurgle Plague Grinder. That will give me two of these torsos and one I made myself, so I'll be able to switch them out accordingly.

A friend of mine suggested making a seperate base to turn the third body into a Daemon Prince. I'm not sure how I could accomplish this, but it sounds intriguing. It would at least add to the options of the army :)

It's turning out nicely. My only complaint is I don't like to drybrush too often if I can avoid it, as it can make the area look fuzzy. Still this has started off nicely so I'm looking forward to honing the technique on other models.

Soul Grinder 4: OSL

2010-02-21T12:08:00.000-08:00

I've always wanted to try OSL (Object Source Lighting). The technique involves painting from a single or multiple light source to replicate a "glowing effect." The easiest way to find the light source is aim a spot light at your object to see the natural highlights and shadows and mimic the effect.

Since Washing the model I started with a watered down Ultra Marines blue followed by a very light dry brush of the same color. From this point I'll start adding finer details using ice blue and mixing up to a little skull white.

The Sword effect is borrowed from the GW version. I was originally going to paint it a green glow, but I'll save that for the nurgle stuff. The blue effect ties in with the model's eyes and sword's hilt blue glow.

Soul Grinder 3: Washing (again)

2010-02-20T16:36:00.000-08:00

I wasn't too fond of how the first wash came out. The Baal Red and Ogryn flesh started out alright adding a nice redness to the muscle/sinew areas, but it still lacked the dark contrast I was hoping for. Normally I wash models heavily with dark inks to get good contrast but I was trying a different method.

After asking some friends at DakkaDakka they convinced me to darken it up some more. With another wash of Devlin Mud to the entire body and some of the metal bits on the claw arm things were looking up for the metallic heathon. I followed up by inking a few of the darker areas with badab black. The end result turned out much better and gave it the contrast it needs to make the highlights "pop"

The picture you see doesn't have any highlights to it. I turned the backlight off and adjusted the image to increase the contrast a little more. This is much closer to the result I'm hoping for.

I wish I could say I was done basing the upper body, but I'm not lol. I still have to go back and clean up some missed areas. Once that's complete I'll give those spots the finishing touches then I'll be ready to add some highlights.

Soul Grinder 2: Washing

2010-02-16T14:14:00.000-08:00

With most of the basing complete I started washing with Ogryn Flesh.

The Sword I based Tin Bitz and washed in Devlin Mudd followed by Ashren Blue. I started to add some blue detail to the weapon as well though it's sort of hard to tell lol.

I applied a light wash of Baal Red to the "stretched" areas of the skin (right pectoral muscle). I saw a few artists paint their Soul Grinders using a similar technique and they turned out fantastic.

This has been a fun model to paint. It's not only big but also has a lot of different details to it which makes it a challenge. Next part to paint is the claw arm and metal details. Once that's complete I'll move to the fine details.

Soul Grinder 1: Base Coat

2010-02-14T23:46:00.000-08:00

We all had a great time over at Crunch's place this weekend. He's moving into the new house in a few weeks, so it was probably our last time hanging out at the old house. Man, almost ten years of partying over there sure has been some good time (I sure hope the new owners can get all those stains out!) Ah memories!

Ahem... where was I... oh yeah

~ ~ ~SOULGRINDER pt I ~ ~ ~

Most of the basing is done on the torso. All that's left are the metal bits and some touch up and he'll be ready for a wash.

Still trying to decide on how to paint the claw arm. I want to keep the machinery detail and armor detail seperate, so I'll probably do a pure coat of Boltgun Metal on the pistons/bolts, TinBitz (woot) on the daemon armor pieces and rivets, and a washed out boltgun metal on the other parts (to make it look like iron).

Tin bitz banner III: Need some input

2010-02-05T19:30:00.000-08:00

I'm working on a new banner for the site and had a few things in mind.

I was doodling the other night and thought of a panoramic scene with a lot of smoke in the background. Through the smoke you can see the space marines eyes glowing and their silhouettes closer they approach. In the middle of the image would be a Captain in Termie honors (looking pretty mean). His retinue would be appearing around him coming towards the viewer.

The "T" on his standard will be the icon for the blog. The color scheme I'm thining of is a combination of pearl white for the armor, TinBitz for the trim, and a dark red as a secondary.

This second one I was looking at an image from the Rule book of Ultra Marines vs. Orks. I'm think of rather than fighting orks they could be fighting current pop-icons like the cast of Avatar, Twilight, and celebrities like Lady Gaga, Tom Cruz, and Kanye West to name a few.

There you have it, just two sketches I'm experimenting with. Once I decide on more specific details I'll post the follow up images.

Testing the RSS feed.

2010-02-01T00:00:00.000-08:00

This is just a test for the RSS feed to my facebook page. Please enjoy these random videos!

Picking a Paint scheme

2010-01-30T08:40:00.000-08:00

I'm trying to decide on a paint scheme for the Lord of Change. Here's a few examples

This one is displayed on the GW website. It's very clean and nice contrast in colors. I especially like the detail on the tips of the wings. The on;y reason why I don't want to paint it this scheme is that most of the LoC I see are this or a variation of it.

Two great examples from the CoolMiniOrNot.com gallery. Both of them are very creative and unique (which I think every painter aspires).

This one is a great model. I really like the bright colors of the wings and armor. The contrast against the skin is fantastic. This really makes the model "pop" and is the direction I'd like to go with my LoC.

This last one is from the cover of Wolf's Honor by Lee Lightner. The light colors and the bright metals look great for contrast. The color scheme in the background is what I plan to do for the base.

There you have it. I'm leaning towards the last one, but any input is appreciated :)

Lord of Change: Glued and ready for GS

2010-01-29T19:35:00.000-08:00

I finally managed to get the LoC to stay together. All that remains is the easy (I hope) attachment of his left arm and gap filling.

As you can see the wings don't sit very well. I think they need to be pinned into place

Using a small carbide bit and dremel, I punched a hole through the wing. It was the perfect size for a brad or paper clip to slip through.

I marked the spot by "painting" the tip of the brad with a sharpie and pressing it against his shoulder. I then made a note of the angle and began to drill into the body.

The angle was pretty good, but the brad refused to stay in place. I switched to a paperclip and bent it to give it some tension and it held nicely.

The next day after work I drilled the other wing. This time it lined up better so the bard worked.

Satisfied with the results I re-glued the right arm (it pulled off slightly while the wing dried). As you can see from the first pic the model leans heavily on the right leg. Considering the weight of the model I may have to pin both legs to the base.

Here's a few examples of some of the gaps in the body. Most noticeably are the wings and how unstable they seat. Nothing a little Green stuff can't fix :)

My advice if you plan to pin a pewter model is let it cool if it gets too hot. At a few points I started melting the model when drilling which caused the bit to slip, lol. Aside from that make sure the bit is in pretty good shape otherwise it may seize up in the process.

CutCleanGluePrimePaintRepeat

2010-01-26T22:37:00.000-08:00

Here's a few quick updates on what I've been working on recently. After a week or so I'll be taking a break from my army to focus on another commision for a friend. I haven't done one since The Eldar Avatar and Yarrick so it will be fun. :D

Added some detail to the Blood Thirster. I was trying some inking a little on his horns.

He needs work on the wings then final clean up and detailing. I'm looking forward to getting this one all done.

While waiting for the Blood Thirster to dry I go back to this guy and refine the details a little. I like his theme so far especially the definition on the torso.

A better view of the ribcage and highlighted foot. The biggest challenge will be the wings. I want them to look different than the other models to accentuate his uniqueness (as he is a named character). I'm thinking of a bat-leather type texture.

THUNDERCATS.....HO!

I've also been touching up the (remaining) Ultramarines. This Captain I started working on his banner. If I get the time I would like to paint the rest of my marines. The ten that I haven't sold I'm thinking of painting one from each of the major chapters like Space Wolves, Crimson Fist, Dark Angels, Blood Angels, etc..

Lord of Change: WIP

2010-01-25T14:12:00.000-08:00

~~~ Lord please change this model to plastic ffs! ~~~

I'm kidding of course, but still pewter can be a righteous pain in the ass at times. Nothing is more frustrating then nearly completing a model only to have heavy parts (like wings) fall off lol. I guess it's my own fault for picking an army that's mostly pewter in the first place.

The model decided to stay together this time which will make filling the gaps with green stuff a lot easier. All that's left now are the wings and the left arm holding a stave.

The model comes with two different staves; the grinning face and the Moon symbol. I'm leaning towards the latter, especially since it weighs less.

By way of design or through mistake, the model is positioned leaning heavily on his left leg. Because of this I think it would look cool to have him attached at an angle leaning off some terrain slightly above the base. This probably sounds odd so I'll post a few pics later in the week to clarify.

Return of the Mac

2010-01-24T21:36:00.000-08:00

It's been a while, I know, and I apologize. I've been so preoccupied with work over the holiday season that I have neglected a great many things. My resolution this year is to catch up with old and new friends, family, and focus on getting a new job. Don't get me wrong I'm happy to be employed, but this job is stressful with little job security. It would be nice to get involved in something I'm interested in like graphic arts. We shall see :)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dear Games Workshop,

Please stop making pewter models. They suck ass!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Currently I'm working on a Greater Daemon of Tzeentch: Lord of Change. Man, this has to be the worst model ever created! Nothing fits properly. The wings aren't cooperating at all. It seems I'll have to break out the drill and start pinning this bad boy. Why did I buy it? Oh yeah, cause I'm stupid! Hah maybe, maybe not, still I'm trying to type with glue on my fingers. Harsh vapors burn my eyes. The model returns my gaze, clearly amused at my torment. Tzeentch why have you forsaken me?!

I apologize for the previous overly-dramatic paragraph. Those responsible have been killed. They spontaneously imploded after having to glue pewter models together!

Making a Carrying Case: pt 1

2009-11-24T14:43:00.000-08:00

Recently, while reading through a lot of how to and DIY threads I got inspired to make my own carrying case. Looking around the house I found a thick plastic tool case I had stuffed away in the closet.

Perfect!

I considered doing the copper coupling method to add slots to the foam, but a majority of my army won't fit in them properly. Instead I took a piece of perforated foam left over from an old case and tore out the sections I needed. Fortunately I was able to get most of my figures in a sheet without much wasted space.

The case is from a Dewalt Tool set that was on display in a hardware store. A lot of those places save them and eventually throw them out, so if you can get your hands on them they work great for storage containers!

Argh... Chaos stuff is too pointy to fit in anything properly, lol. I think this will work out in the end, though.

Next Iadded more to the bottom layer then start on the top half. For that I used a piece of foam board and glued it to the foam with spray adhesive.

The uncut piece of foam board.

Here I used pieces that were about the same height and cut them to fit

Since this layer is thinner I may use it for more troops and oddities.

The foam on the bottom of the lid comes out and holds the rules books, dice, etc.

That's it so far. This weekend I'll get to gluing the foam together and making adjustments. After that I'll give it a coat of paint and maybe the Imperial Aquilla or Chaos Symbol.

Blood Letters: Near Completion

2009-11-22T14:15:00.000-08:00

Like the Blood Thirster, the first squad of Blood letters is near completion. Once I decided on how to paint them it went fast. The only thing that I was concerned about was if the Krylon primer would hold up and it did. Monday I'll be picking up another can and prime the rest of the army.

Blood Thirster: Nearly Finished

2009-11-21T18:57:00.001-08:00

My apologies for the lack of posts lately. The Company I work for has been put through the ringer with all the Medicare changes lately which in turn has everyone in our office working longer and more complicated days.

Fortunately for me, though, I have a mini-vacation coming up. I had to work two on call shifts in a row (about 12 days on with 7 of those being 24 hour on call). The schedule change allows me to have Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years Eve off (woot). Overall it's a good thing :)

I know that you would rather see some 40k stuff. Good, because I'd rather talk about 40k stuff.

Here's an update to the Blood Thirster. He's much closer to completion, just needs touch ups in some areas and more detailing (you can never have too much detail).

The base has been darkened and washed with red and brown tones. The "white hot" lava was a fun test, but it didn't really match the style of a Khorne Daemon and as Crunch pointed out looks a lot like popcorn. I'm much happier with the result now. It looks like a mix of lava and blood.

I also tried out a technique on the Axe blade to give it a better 3d effect. I'll have some close up pictures up this week.

Copper BITZ

2009-11-07T12:26:00.000-08:00

I was looking through a few DIY posts and saw an interesting way to make carrying cases. Here's the first result using a copper coupling and a grinder.

Tools Used

Copper Fitting: 1" for 25mm base and 1 1/2 for 40mm
Dremel or another grinder/sharpening tool.
Dense foam: Tall enough to cover your model

Step 1: Using a sharpening/grinding tool (Dremel) grind down the inside edge of a copper coupling. Since it is pretty soft, copper will only take a few minutes to get a good edge.

Step 2: Smooth the rough edges down.

Step 3) Pick the spot you want to puncture. Be sure to leave enough room between models and the edge of the foam.

Step 4) Gently twist and push down the coupling. You should feel it tear slowly at first then give easily to the pressure. Make sure to keep the coupling level with the foam (not angled)

Step 5) Force a dwarf to go down there!

Find anything?

-___-

WARNING: bad pun..

Overview: I'd say it's worth trying if you have the tools lying around. There's probably other uses for this like digging tunnels in terrain or making craters.

PROS:

Cheap and Easy (depending on if you have access to items)
Little to no clean up
Versatile. Allows you to place and add models as you see fit.

CONS:

Requires a little effort at first getting the right angle on the coupling
Some models won't fit well due to lots of out stretching limbs, parts, spikes etc.
May cause you to make bad jokes

~Ask the Bit Heads~ Your Favorite Army

2009-11-06T13:55:00.000-08:00

We asked some of the Bit Heads what they think about their favorite armies. Here's what they have to say

S2ua7

What is your favorite thing about your army? Looks? Play style?

The favorite thing about my army is the numbers game. What I mean by that is the extreme amount of firepower that they have. I've always been fascinated with something called the law of large numbers which states:

“If the probability of a given outcome to an event is P and the event is repeated N times, then the larger N becomes, so the likelihood increases that the closer, in proportion, will be the occurrence of the given outcome to N*P.”

With commands such as First Rank Fire! Second Rank Fire!, a squad of 50 guardsmen throws out 140 shots from their Lasguns (laspistols for the sergeant) assuming they are all in 12" range. This means that even though Lasguns are relatively week, assuming that they can wound, chances are even the toughest infantry model is going to go down.

Why did you decide to play them?

I decided to play them because I like the idea of playing normal humans. At first I was going to play Witch Hunters with my focus being more on the Sisters of Battle, and less on the Inquisitors, but then I noticed how little I actually get from the IG book and thought that I would do it in reverse by owning an IG army and supplement them with the Sisters of battle.

If you could change something about them what would it be? Is there a certain rule that you think needs to be retooled or removed for them?

I honestly don't think i would change anything with the IG. They seem pretty powerful and contain many options to succeed even though I haven't won very many games (I think this is due to armies being created without research, trial and error is so much fun). If you increased any aspect of a figure or lowered point costs I think we would begin to see some overpoweredness.

The only exception is the Ogryn squad. At 130 points and 40 points per additional figure, they seem a little over priced for what they can do. The Ripper gun is pretty cool, but come on, at a range of 12", your only getting one shot with them before being assaulted by the enemy at a BS of 3 (The description of the ripper gun states that "...it is all but impossible for the Ogryns to miss.") which means that 50 percent of the 9 shots (no additional Ogryn) should miss. I would rather take my chances with an additional infantry platoon over the Ogryn.

____________________________

Hoot

What is your favorite thing about your army? Looks? Play style?

I play many different armies, so I will break it all down

Imperial Guard - looks, I love the simplistic man vs immeasurable odds nothing special just normal guys with the M-16 of the galaxy, some flak armor, and mass attrition. Just started getting this army together haven't really played them yet and to be honest from what I have seen I would not change much.

Chaos Marines - Again the looks of the models are awesome. I like the way there is multiple troop choices in the army so you have these different squads that all have some type of special ability whether its extra toughness or magic powers.

The MAJOR thing I would change about them is the fact that there equipment being the same as space marines, why do the land raiders cost more while also transporting less amount of men. DROP PODS only in apocalypse LAME.

Points are pretty hefty also, really with all the space marine updates Space Wolves for example their troops are still 15 pts each and they get some pretty cool bonuses compared to 1k sons who are 23 pts a piece with a 4+ inv save and the negative of slow and purposeful, I think the spread is a little lopsided.

Tyranid - Again I like the models for this army, but I think more than that I just really started playing them since I got such a great deal on an army. I am into my 2200 point army with a nice case for no more than $220 dollars.

I like painting them and the fact that they are just a swarm of devouring destruction that are never ending. After reading some books about Tyranid invasions what really made me love this army was putting myself in the shoes of some poor imperial citizen on the verge of an invasion the unrelenting helplessness I would feel knowing what I know about this army.

What I don't like is simple, no ranged weapons that can destroy tanks.

Tau - By this time your probably wondering WTF this guy plays way to many armies, but my obsession stemmed from wanting to know everything about my opponents army and the fact I got a good friend in the industry and he constantly is making me ridiculous deals on new armies. Back to the Tau, while the models are cool I think my subconscious love for Robotech caused my interest in the models.

I love the range, shooting, technology, gearing up units with all sorts of cool equipment, CRISIS SUITS ROCK. What I would change, not much, I really think that kroot are really weak for being the Tau's front line hand to hand fighters.

Finally,
Eldar - wow let me start by just saying I love the way the models look even though most the models are old styles the bright paint schemes that pop is what really caused me to hone my painting skills and I am proud to say that it was my eldar that won me my first recognized painting award. The thing that I look forward to and love when playing Eldar is the look on my opponents face when I start telling them all the crap my units can do.

I love saying things like now my guys are moving, fleeting, and charging you with 30 power weapon attacks and that's right after my farseer is dooming the unit I am charging

Blood Crusher: 1 Primed

2009-11-05T15:11:00.000-08:00

Here's the Blood Crusher with the same base technique and washing.

Be'Lakor: 2 Primed and Washed

2009-11-04T14:44:00.000-08:00

Here he is with the krylon satin burgundy base coat and a quick wash of Devlin Mud.

Blood Thirster: Basing Complete

2009-11-03T14:33:00.000-08:00

Here's an update to the Blood Thirster. The base coat has been cleaned up a little and added in the metallic paints to the armor and weapons. All that's left is some more bleach bone and he'll be ready for washing.

EDIT: Fixed the pic :)

Be'Lakor: 1 Assembled

2009-11-02T19:12:00.000-08:00

Be'Lakor, the Dark Master (aka my Daemon Prince) assembled and ready for a base coat. I'm going to do the Krylon Burgandy again since it worked pretty good on the other models.

Blood Thirster: Face Palm!

2009-11-02T14:04:00.000-08:00

The other night I was trying to repair what I thought to be a bent talon on his wing when SNAP! Off went the bastard thing and nearly impaled my friends cat in the process. Luckily I was able to repair the damages. As for the cat, well he can always get another cat.

I present you with the new and improved Blood Thirster, now with less broken parts!

He's decided to cooperate by not doing any more face-plants on the floor (for now). I shall reward him with more paint! Here's the base coat of Mechrite Red on the skin and some bleached bone started on teeth and claws.

Be'Lakor, The Dark Master

2009-10-31T12:26:00.000-07:00

Today we went to the local gaming shop to pick up some paints. Since the owner was busy I decided to browse through his GW catalogs and something caught my eye. Be'Lakor, The Dark Master in the collectors section. I've seen this guy in a few battle reports before, but I assumed he was from another game (since I never saw him in any normal armies).

I asked him if he's seen this guy before and he said "Yeah, in fact I just ordered one and he's still sitting in the shipping box." After a few minutes of digging we found it. This must be fate!

Priming the Beast

2009-10-30T14:05:00.000-07:00

The other day I picked up some Valejo green primer and thought I'd try it out on a beast of Nurgle.

I wasn't too sure of how this would look, but I figured if it was terrible I could always strip the model and start over.

A coat of Devlin Mud and I was satisfied with the green primer.

Next some Snakebite Leather dry brushing followed by brown ink in the recesses.

Added another wash of 25 Camo Green:25 Devlin Mud:50 Water. Made a nice slimy finish.

There you have it. I wasn't sure at first how this would look, but I think it will make a good green base color. Next up will be Epidemus and some Nurglings. :)

Bloodthirster: Fiery basing

2009-10-30T06:30:00.000-07:00

The Bloodthirster has been a real pain in the ass!

Last week while glue was drying on the base he decided he wanted to "fly" and did a face plant on the floor, breaking off his arm (holding axe) and bending part of his left wing. To my amazement he was still attached to the base.

Then the other night over at Hoot's place I tried bending the wing a little to straighten it when it finally gave and snapped off his shoulder.

SNAP!

Luckily the Green stuff was an exact fit so it glued into place with little work. You're lucky you little bastard, otherwise I'd have to beat you for your defiance!

Anyway, I decided to use a quick basing technique I saw on CoolMiniorNot.com forums. I like the idea of simplifying techniques for new painters so I thought I'd try it out too.

Primed Skull white

A heavy drybrush of Golden Yellow, followed by a lighter brushing of Blazing Orange

A lighter coat of blood red at the top.

Next a coat of Scorch Brown followed by Chaos black.

Refining the colors a little bit. I added more red and a little orange.

It looks pretty cool. I think I'll get the Blood Thirster table top then see how I like it. I figure I can tweak the colors if it ends up being too dark.

What do you think of this base? Comments are always appreciated :)

Nids/Nids vs IG/Necron

2009-10-26T11:55:00.000-07:00

I had to work another weekend so I missed most of the gaming, but I did manage to get a few shots.

The aftermath of the 2v2 game. Nids barely pulled out a victory due to the Necrons phasing out. I heard the Command squads were nuked early on and prevented the IG soldiers from recieving commands.

Hoot's place

2009-10-25T11:02:00.000-07:00

Over at Hoot's place the other night

I continued basing my bloodletters.

Meanwhile Hoot got busy on his Cadian Squad.

While trying to liberate a soldier's arm from his body, Hoot missed and speared his Xacto blade into his thumb.

Crunch purchased two Imperial terrain pieces.

He also got busy assembling his Necron Warriors

Bathed in.... mud?

2009-10-24T11:52:00.000-07:00

The Bloodletters took a Devlin mud bath followed by some brown ink on the rocks. I'm satisfied with the results so far, especially with the Burgandy primer (considering it was an alternative color).

Kharnak is the first Pewter model I used this color on. I wasn't very pleased with the way it was turning out (pink meat), but after a wash of 50:50 Devlin mud/Badab black it's starting to look promising.

Battle Wagon

2009-10-22T14:37:00.000-07:00

Here's a few pics of Crunch's Battle wagon.

After priming it black he did a light drybrush of TinBitz

After some Boltgun Metal and checkerboarding it was finished. Quick, easy, and looks cool :)

The Ultraaa Ork and DakkaAngel Ork lead the charge.

Video: RC models

2009-10-21T15:01:00.000-07:00

You think your Land Raider is bad, check out what these guys did. Talk about taking the hobby to the next level lol.

RC landraider with working guns and lights

This next one is a regular sized LR with a tether

RC Baneblade with wirking turrets

Just in case you haven't seen it, here's the life size BR Rhino.

Crunch's Bastion

2009-10-20T14:00:00.000-07:00

Our buddy Crunch is a master of woodwork. We often give him a hard time for his MacGyver like ability to craft things from scrap lumber, but that's another story. His new terrain project is a defensive bastion made from masonite. It's very solid and pretty light weight.

Check it out

Foam packaging from a computer box. The foam is dense enough for structures, yet soft enough to easily cut with a razor knife.

At 4 feet long it runs the length of the table.

The openings are just big enough for a Ork Battle Wagon to fit, though not a Bane Blade. I wonder if that was intentional?

His next step is a layer of drywall gap filler to add texture to the foam areas. From there he's going to give it a thin coat of textured spray paint. More pics next weekend (when I'm off call lol).

_____________________

For no reason at all, here's a MacGyver clip.

Video: Making a Piranha Plant

2009-10-19T13:45:00.000-07:00

Saw this on youtube recently. He did an awesome job on the detail. This model is for sale if you're interested

Author: Kalapusa
Auction: Realistic Piranha Plant Sculpture

Nurgle: Plague Grinder

2009-10-18T14:30:00.000-07:00

Working on a wireframe of the PlagueGrinder. Currently he's atop a regular Soul Grinder's framework, but once this guy is done I'll start on his chassis. It will have larger back legs with smaller front ones (indicating his huge girth).

This model (torso) will also sit on a separate 60mm base to work as a Great Unclean One as well.

The Nurgle Plague Grinder faces an Ultra Marines Captain

Size Comparison; The PB is about the same height as a normal SG.

RUN AWAY! RUN AWAY!

The Ultra Marines launch a counter attack

Bloodthirster: GS gap filling and Texturing

2009-10-18T09:53:00.000-07:00

The Bloodthirster is primed and ready to go. You can see what a difference Green Stuff adds to the model. To get this effect I gradually worked the GS into the groves and textured using a wire brush. Simple, but very effective.

The Green Stuff will also help support the wings.

After priming you can't tell any work had been to it. That's the best effect!

Forge World Goodness

2009-10-16T13:35:00.000-07:00

Mmmm... Forge World. Great models but a bit pricey. I often find myself digging through their site admiring their handiwork and wishing I had money to spend lol.

These are the models I would probably get (obviously all Chaos)

Great Unclean One
Price: £97.85 ($160.07 US)

Keeper of Secrets
Price: £83.20 ($136.11 US)

Blood Thirster
Price: £132.15 ($216.18 US)

Khorne Daemon Prince
Price: £43.06 ($70.44 US)

1 British pound = 1.6359 U.S. dollars and shiping cost is 15% of the order total. It's a pretty hefty fee for any model collector.Still very much worth it if you can afford it. I need to get a yard sale going when it gets nicer lol.

What I need to do is find a US vendor that stocks Forge World and order from them. Hopefully there will be some sort of price break from the MSRP because retail FW is just too rich for my blood.

The GODS Demand PAINT!

2009-10-15T15:30:00.000-07:00

And they shall have paint!

Today started out pretty cold and nasty, lots of rain, then cleared up around noon. Maybe it was just a low pressure front from the pacific coast? Perhaps it's the Chaos Gods demanding that their followers get a fresh coat? It's not my place to question, but to paint!

Khorne Daemons

Grey for the Blood God? I don't think so

Soul Grinders

Two coats of Flat black.

I left the other top half of a grinder in the death forge (aka my desk). He's still being punished for stealing (and eating) my ham sandwich, and is being punished by getting a green stuff makeover.

Bloodletters and Hounds

After 3 light coats of Burgandy

Ready to go clubbin' um-cha-um-cha-um-cha....

Now that's devotion

2009-10-14T21:37:00.000-07:00

I wonder if this is a water transfer?

I can only imagine what if he'll get if he plays Sistas-O-Battle. Maybe something like this
Or maybe Space Wolves? Aaaahhhooooooo CooOOoookie Crisp!
But this, this HAS to be the worst tattoo of all time lmao.

Check out Tattoofailure.com for more
Warning some partial nudity and lots of terrible tats

Yeah dude we know...

Warhammer Wednesday: Priming tips

2009-10-14T12:30:00.000-07:00

Priming models with spray paint
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Why should I prime? That's a good question. Priming your models will help bring out the color qualities in a model and also helps with paint adhesion. It can speed up your paint job depending on what type of base color you chose. Some will argue if you must prime a model before painting, but most will agree that it helps preserve your model in the long run.

What color should I use? Black is a very popular choice when starting out since working from darkest to lightest is a common method. Using a white primer brings out lighter colors (like Eldar) while others prefer grey since it is a good medium tone.

Lets say you just started playing Orks and have 100 models to paint. You could use a flat olive or camo green for a basecoat, throw on a wash, and some quick colors and you're table top ready. A friend of mine did this and won best painted recently at a local tourney, lol.

Here's a list of some different kinds of primers

Games Workshop: Chaos Black is more forgiving but costs a lot more. A few people claim that since GW changed paint suppliers they have been getting more batches of bad paint cans. All I can say is every can I used worked exceptionally well.
Vallejo Black Primer - Another nice primer. Personally I haven't tried it, though many reviews I've seen really like it overall.
Krylon FLAT Indoor/Outdoor: I love this stuff! Takes a little patience but worth the effort. Has an adjustable nozzle for better spray control. Available in lots of colors. Did I mention CHEAP!
Krylon SATIN Indoor/Outdoor: It varies depending on the type of model you want to paint. I found satin black doesn't work as well as flat black on plastics and scrapes off easier on pewter models. I used the Burgandy Satin on a test plastic model and it turned out pretty nice.
Krylon Primers: I've tried the white (can't find black locally) and it didn't work as well as the flat counterpart. It went on thin but didn't take as well. It took about seven coats before I could get a decent finish. Both had the least amount of "fuzzy" compared to most whites so they aren't bad for the price.
Krylon Fusion Plastic Primers: It would chip off a little. Not a big deal if you want tabletop, but for quality minis I wouldn't suggest it. Good stuff for terrain.
Quick Color: Not so great. It peeled off too easily for my preference. Some people have better luck with this than I do. Good for table top and terrain stuff.
Board 2 Pieces: One can worked for me, the other clogged (siezed) after a few uses. I changed 5 nozzles, thinner, etc. The local vendor said it may have been on the shelf for too long. That may be true, but why buy a paint that goes bad so quickly? Runs about $7.99.
Design Master Flat Black: I had this lying around and tested it on a sprue. It chipped off very very easily.

Spraying Tips:

Shake the can until you hear the ball rattle (anywhere from 30sec to 1min). Depending on how much you paint you'll want to shake the can more during use to keep the paint smooth and prevent nozzle buildup.
Hold the can upright. Having the can tilted too much will cause it to spray unevenly.
Spray just before and after the model.
Spray the model in a quick sweeping motion. Back and forth. This prevents running
Only spray for a few seconds at most to prevent paint buildup. Don't get trigger happy :)
Cover all sides equally, top and bottom. It will give a nice even coat.
Turn the can upside down after use and spray until no paint comes out (just air). This will help keep the nozzle clean and prevent "spurts"

Here's my picks for Best/worst overall (from what I have used)
Best Quality: Chaos Black by GW. Very forgiving of mistakes. I've had no problems with any cans.
Best Value: Krylon Flat indoor/outdoor $1.50-$3.00 @ Walmart
Best Tabletop: Krylon again. Cheap and easy. Flat and Primers first choice, Satin second, Gloss if nothing else.
Worst Overall: Design Master for priming

Blood (red) for the Blood God!

2009-10-13T23:10:00.000-07:00

Last night I got everything ready to prime outside for when I got off work today (which is rare since I'm lazy). It seems the Gods have other things in mind, though, since today the tempature dropped and it's been raining non stop. NO blood for the Blood god today.

Still, I managed to get a test model done for some primers I picked up. Here are the results so far.

The one on the left was done with two quick coats of Krylon Burgandy and a Badab black wash. The left one is Krylon Flat Black followed by two thin coats of Mechrite red base.

Painting time: about 3 mins

Painting time: roughly 30 mins

Overall I like the results of the Burgundy coat better, especially since it saves a lot of time. For the purpose of this army I want to test my skills at faster painting troop choices. I also tried this on a Pewter model with much different results; it turned out with a pinkish hue and was scraping a little on the edges. Once the weather clears up I can test it some more.

Have any Suggestions? Comments are always appreciated :)

Banners For Buddies Foundation

2009-10-11T21:30:00.000-07:00

I'm starting a new organization called Banners for Buddies (BfB). That's right! It's time to give back to the community. I wonder if I can write this off as a charitable tax deduction?

Here's a few banners for my buddy S2ua7. Let me know what you think. The last one is my favorite ^_____^

Yeah I know his eyes are crossed, lol. Who has time to focus when it's LUNCH TIME SOLDIER!

Video: SM Battle report

2009-10-11T10:17:00.000-07:00

I was surfing around and found this sweet video battle report. Check it out. The effects are fantastic!

750 Khorne Daemons vs. Orkz Speed Freakz

2009-10-10T07:00:00.000-07:00

Haste makes waste. I was reminded of this as I opened my case and realized I made a big mistake... I left most of my army (and camera) at home! Crunch was gracious enough to allow me to posses his extra Orks and proxy them as Chaos Daemons.

Points: 750 standard compulsory
Game Type: Annihilation
Scenario: After a recent victory the Orkz are busy looting an imperial foundry for more DAKKA DAKKA! Suddenly the Daemons of Khorne tear into reality from the warp, anxious to rend and tear in the name of the Blood God. The two forces prepare to do battle!

Orkz Speed Freakz:

HQ - Ork Warboss
Troop - Boyz squad in Trukk
Troop - Boyz squad in Trukk
Fast - Stormboyz w/ Boss Zagstruk
Total - 750 points.

Daemons of Khorne:

HQ - Herald of Khorne on Chariot
Troop - Bloodletters x8
Troop - Bloodletters x6
Elite - Bloodcrushers x3
Heavy - Soul Grinder w/ Phlegm
Heavy - Soul Grinder w/ Phlegm
Total - 749 points.

Turn 1: The Daemons won initiative and decided to go last. The two Ork trukks moved into cover position to finish their turn.

Now for the Daemons. Praying to the Gods for a good roll of 3+ I was rewarded with a 5 and allowed to bring in my preferred group; two Soul Grinders and the three Blood Crushers. Both Soul Grinders came in without too much deviation. The Blood Crushers also had good position behind the Ork Trukk on the left side. Both Soul Grinders fired at the target farthest from the Crushers with minimal success. They managed to get two crew stunned results.

Kill Points

Khorne Daemons: 0 Da Orkz: 0

Turn 2: Orkz retaliate. Crunch ran his truck around and behind my Crushers to give it a cover save from the Soul Grinder. Da boyz disembarked and assaulted the three Blood Crushers. After 80 attacks from the first Ork boyz squad, the Daemons managed to shake off all but two wounds resulting in the first death of the game. It looked like a single Blodcrusher would remain, but then the Mighty War Boss swung his Power Klaw resulting in the first kill point of the game. The Orks cheered at their bloody carnage and began looting.

Meanwhile the Blood God favored his Bloodletters as both squads were allowed to enter the game without any mishaps. Knowing there was a big nasty squad of Stormboyz in reserve, the Bloodletters took up positions near each Soul Grinder.

Kill Points

Khorne Daemons: 0 Da Orkz: 1

Turn 3: With a successful roll of 6 the Stormboyz enter the game and barely avoided a deep strike mishap. With Boss Zagstruk leading them they were able to immediately enter assault and charged at a Soul Grinder. Boss Zagstruk spat out a curse and grumbled as he then realized that only his weapon would be able to penetrate the Soul Grinder's 13 armor. Boss Zagstruk flailed viscously and managed to bang-up the Soulgrinder's armor, but the beast held strong... dented, but unscathed.

Now the Orks fury turned the other direction towards the other bloodletters. They held a defensive formation on the higher ground and shot into the unsuspecting servants of the blood god. The Bloodletters manage to survive with only a single loss. In an unexpected move one of the Ork Trukks turned and rammed the blindside of the other Soulgrinder. Smashing him with all his might, the Ork Trukk came to a halt against the mass of the mighty beast.

Seething with fury the daemons retaliate! The Blood God allows his Herald to enter the battle. He immediately rides towards the large group of Stormboyz, thirsty for blood. With his gaze fixed on the shooting Orks, the Soulgrinder moves away from the Trukk into a better shooting position. The Soul Grinder took a deep breathe and hurled a massive ball of phlegm. The attack was successful and destroyed the second trukk resulting in the first kill point for the daemon army. The three surviving Orks managed to pile out before the explosion and were forced to go to ground in difficult terrain, covered in a thick layer of sticky mucus.

Determined to wreak havoc, the Bloodletters go after the other trukk. Four of their Hell blades twist and tear through it's armor for a second kill point. The Trukk exploded violently leaving a crater and five Daemons covered in soot and charred flesh.

On the other side of the board the other squad of Bloodletters charge the Stormboyz battling the Soulgrinder. The assault goes to the daemons, but thanks to Boss Zagstruk's quick thinking, he kills off a Stormboy restoring morale to his squad and they stand their ground.

Kill Points

Khorne Daemons: 2 Da Orkz: 1

Turn 4: The battle continues. The remaining five Bloodletters and the Herald on his chariot join the assault. This time the daemons manage to deliver the fatal blow against the Stormboyz squad. Now, all that remained was the Ork Warboss and his retinue of Ork Boyz on the plain slightly above them. Determined to spill blood, the Herald, Bloodletters, and Soulgrinder rallied and dashed towards the remaining Orkz. Regardless of the enemy, Orkz are da biggest and baddest! Nothing will deter them from smashin 'eads and lootin' da teeth. The Warboss scowled, raised his gigantic Power Klaw and roared "Waaaaaggh!" It was time to end this.

Kill Points

Khorne Daemons: 4 Da Orkz: 1

Turn 5: Waaaaaggh! Behind their mighty Warboss, the Orkz charge down the ramp into the oncoming flood of Blood Daemons. It's the final clash as the leaders of both armies face off. At this point, however, the Daemons wanted to taste blood and would settle for no less. With a higher initiative the Blood Letters struck first, killing every charging Ork except for the Warboss. The massive Ork glared as his entire squad was cut apart. In a frenzy, the Mighty Ork struck back taking two more Bloodletters, leaving one remaining in that squad. Deciding to fall back before he is over run, He manages to escape the wrath of all the sweeping advances, but at the last second the last bloodletter slashes the Giant Orks hide resulting in another kill point.

Kill Points

Khorne Daemons: 6 Da Orkz: 1

Turn6: Not satisfied, the blood god decides the game must continue! The Deamons charge the remaining Ork Nob. With dangerous terrain on his side, the Ork grits his teeth and smiles, spitting out his cigar and welcoming the final assault. With one final mighty attack the Nob swings his Power Klaw at the single Bloodletter, hoping to take him down with him. He managed to hit two times and needed to roll anything but a 1 to force the single bloodletter to make a 5+ inv. save. The Ork rolled double ones (snake eyes) resulting in both misses. The Daemon lept above the Ork and thrust his Hellblade through the Nobz skull severing his head from his body and dealing the final death blow to the Orkz. The Blood God smiled as his warriors stood victorious among pools of blood and severed body parts.

Kill Points

Khorne Daemons: 7 Da Orkz: 1

Result: Victory to the Daemons!

Daemon of the Game: Although the Soul Grinder held strong, the Blood God favored one of his bloodletters by denying a kill point to the Orkz. This same Bloodletter was the only survivor against the Warboss' furious attacks whom he later managed to kill. The Surviving Bloodletter later became a Blood Crusher for his exploits.

The Aftermath: This was a great game for me since it was my first 1-on-1 with the Chaos Daemons. Crunch's Orks have been steamrolling a lot recently and this was a true test on whether the Daemons could hold their own.

Like 90% of most of our games it started out pretty heated as both of us argue the rules. Things quickly calmed down as we both realized the match could go either direction. I was fortunate enough not to have any poor deep strike rolls and was allowed my choice group to go in first.

Crunch was not happy that the Stormboyz assaulted the Soul Grinder and I agree. Had they managed to attack a bloodletters squad instead they may have caused more casualties. Alas, that is the fate of the dice. Still, both Soulgrinders and Bloodletters squads were both positioned so either could assist in the coming Stormboyz assault. More than likely a squad of Bloodletters would have died, though the soul grinder and other blooletters would have joined the next round. It would have been close either way. I look forward to our rematch, hopefully next weekend.

GG

Bloodthirster base WIP

2009-10-09T16:00:00.000-07:00

Another quick update. Here's a few pics of the base so far for the Bloodthirster. The theme for this one will be a mix between lava/magna and burning skulls.

Step One: I mixed some drywall gap filler and a few small rocks together and worked it onto the base.

Step Two: As it started to cure I began shaping it some more. Although it says wait 24 hours to fully cure, you can usually get good results within a few hours.

Step Three: A quick fit. I pressed the BT into place to get an idea of the foot print. So far so good! Since he's such a heavy model he'll probably need to be pinned (but I'll do that later lol)

For good measure I filled the gaps on the back of the wings. Even after cleaning and fitting the wings in better they we're still very unstable.

Nurgle Great Unclean One

2009-10-08T20:30:00.000-07:00

Working a little more on the Nurgle Great Unclean one/Plague Grinder. The first few pics show the work to the horns. I started with a piece of green stuff about the size of a pea and rolled it out about the width of a pencil and twice the length of the horn. I let it cure for about 15 minutes, then wound it from the skull to the tip of the horn. From there I began to manipulate the shape more to my liking.

Also added a nice big, disgusting sore to his forehead lol.

From here I'm going to clean up the face a little more then start on the framwork of the upper body.

Warhammer Wednesday: More Nurgle Fun

2009-10-07T22:20:00.000-07:00

Tonight we worked on some more terrain over at Crunch's place. His main project is an Imperial Stronghold for Planet Strike and so far it's turning out great. Hopefully he'll have pics on his blog soon(yeah I'm talking to you Crunch) :P

As for me, I'm just starting on my Nurgle Great Unclean One/Plague Grinder. My idea is to have a model that can double as both. I have the sketches down, now just working on the framework for this beast. Here's a few pics of the head so far...

This is the first phase of the head. The next part will be to flesh out the horns. My plan is to lay thin strips of GS (like Linguine), let them cure, then wrap them up the stem of the horn to create a textured look. I'll have some pics up of the progress (now that I found my camera).

What do you think of this model so far? Comments and Suggestions are always welcome!

SWIN3 FL3W ....oink ....oink

2009-10-06T17:09:00.000-07:00

I apologize for the lack of posts this past week. Aside from being on call I also got really sick (not swine flu) and am just now shaking it off. Whew... Nothing is worse than sitting around doing nothing, amirite?

Good News, though, today I was promoted to the #1 guy and I got a raise, the only one to get one mwa ha ha >:). j/k... The only bad thing is that now I have to work on Saturdays, but still get Sunday plus Monday off. Not too bad, considering Saturday isn't too crazy (unless you're on call). What sucks is I can't play 40k with my homies, but I'll start playing at the Local Game Store so it's all good. It will give me more reason to get the army in fighting shape.

Speaking of which, the Chaos Daemon army is coming along nicely. I've been slow on progression, but I'm pumped to get it done now. The question remains on how and what to build. I've been looking through various GS creations and have some in mind, I just need to sit down and start designing them. Primarily I will make a few of my own Tzeentch flamers and some nurgle stuff, but my goal is to get some greater daemons done like the Lord of Change. There's a 1750 tournament coming up and I want to be ready for it.

Sunday Quickie

2009-09-27T15:16:00.000-07:00

Just a quick update. Still on call so not much going on today lol. Right now I'm working on a conversion for my army.

Greater Daemon of Slaanesh: Keeper of Secrets.

The body is based on the original GW model. The face is a variation of things. The general idea is the straps on the face cover it's true identity, hence the Keeper of Secrets fluff. Most conversions I've seen are female, so I thought I'd try a male version of sorts.

What do you think so far? I'm working on a vector of the face to clarify the scheme a little. Should be up tomorrow. I'm also working on a Halloween banner for the site. Pics up soon :)

2v2 Tourney this weekend.

2009-09-26T18:30:00.000-07:00

Bah, another week on call. Don't get me wrong, the extra money is nice, but I'm missing out on a tourney with my friends lol. I hope they do well.

Tourney Rules: Two players per team, 500 points each/1000 total. Each player has to provide one HQ and one troop choice, the rest is open.

Team Name: Taste the Rainbow
Players: Hoot and Crunch
Armies: Eldar and Ork
Tactics: Hoot is running an Avatar with a group of 30 Ork boyz out in front. Meanwhile, Crunch has a battlewagon full of Burnas and a Big Mek equipped with a shield generator. For added fire power Hoot has a squad of Rangers to hinder incoming enemy advances along with a nasty bunch of Striking Scorpions in reserves. Overall it's a pretty solid list and I think they will do well.

Team Name: Mage against the Regime
Players: S2ua7 and Mike aka "Guy"
Armies: Imperial Guard and Space Marines/Blood Angels
Tactics: S2ua7 has nearly perfected his IG army including a Valkyrie, Leman Russ tank, a squad of troops, and a command squad. They have proven to be quite difficult to stop and offer a lot of offensive and defensive fire power. If that wasn't enough "Guy" has a beefy squad of assault termies and a thunderfire cannon to rain down on the opposition. Add in his snipers with Telion, they have a lot of flexibility and staying power. It will be fun to see how they do.

Both teams have different setups so it will be interesting to see how they perform against the other teams. My guess is that there will be a majority of Ork and Space Marines variations (due to the Black Reach box set).

UPDATE: Grats to "Taste the Rainbow" for having best painted :D

WHW: Basing Basics

2009-09-23T18:30:00.000-07:00

Here's a quick and easy way to base your models.
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Materials: White hobby glue (Elmer's) or PVA glue, basing material (I use playground sand) and something to spread with (popsicle stick)

Step 1: Apply glue to the front and back of the base.

Step 2: Spread the glue to cover the base completely. It helps to clean the top edge of the base with your finger.

Step 3: Gently move your model into the sand. I prefer to bury it up to the knees. This works with painted models too, just make sure to push them in carefully :)

Step 4: Profit! You now have a quick and easy base for your army. It helps to tap off excess sand and run your finger around the edge to clean it up.

Depending on the size and shape of the sand you may need to do a second layer to cover the base completely. Some people prefer to base their models after they paint them. I prefer to base them before priming as it helps to "lock" the sand in place. This also makes painting the rocks a lot easier (if you plan to paint them that is).

Different methods yield different results

Did you find this useful? Anything to add? Comments are always welcome :)

New Army: Chaos Daemons

2009-09-22T06:29:00.000-07:00

After selling off most of my Ultra Marines, I decided to start another army. It came down to Tau, Eldar, and Chaos Daemons. I decided, obviously, on the latter and am pleased with the results. Don't get me wrong, I don't advocate the forces of evil, this just happens to be a pretty cool army :)

Chaos Spear Head, another Grinder, and a Chaos Lord.

I love plastic...

...and I HATE PEWTER!

Everything so far, minus a few headless hounds :D

What's next? Filling some gaps and cleaning details a little then priming. I'll have those pics up in a few days :)

Blood for the Blood God!

Saturday wit da Boyz

2009-09-20T19:50:00.000-07:00

This weekend we tried something new. The scenario was to see how long our troops could survive before they got slaughtered by the Orks. Each player was allowed 125 points. Our opponent, an endless wave of Orks. They began slowly with a few Boyz and eventually building up to Kommandos, Killa cans, and Stormboyz in the frey. It was a very fun and fast paced game.

Left to Right: Bo with his Thunderfire cannon and Crunch's Big Mekon the upper left, my Blood Letters on the bottom left, Hoot and his Tau at the bottom, Kyle's Sternguard and S2ua7's IG holding the right flank

Ready to defend in the name of the Emperor!

Bo punishes a few unlucky Ork Boyz

Hoot's Crisis Suit gets tied up in CC with some angry Orks.

Battered and bruised, but still stanbding

A few Kommandos enter the mix, but my Daemons are ready to intercept

First game we survived nine rounds before finally being over run with a full scale assault. It was a lot of fun and hopefully we'll try it again pretty soon.

Warhammer Wednesday: Big Mek

2009-09-16T20:49:00.000-07:00

Tonight was rather short (since most of us worked late), and it's been a pretty busy week. Hoot is working on finishing up the Avatar and it is looking sweet! Pics up this weekend. As for Crunch he is nearly finished painting the last of da Burnas for the tournament. I think that just leaves his Kustom Big Mek and he's finished as well.

Aside from magnetizing a few Terminator arms I'm also working on terrain ideas for the next week. They will probably be Catachan and Ork themed. I have a few sketches going lol.

Other than that I'm narrowing it down to which of two armies I want to play next; Eldar or Tau. I've seen both in action and are pretty sweet, not to mention I can get a good deal on either one. I would play IG also, but there's too many of us running them and I want to try something different :)

Avatar III - Ready for the Tournament

2009-09-14T23:07:00.001-07:00

Here's an update on the Avatar for Hoot. I turned it over to him so he could work on the details on the armor. I'm fairly pleased with the results, though given more time I'd like to add a bit more to the lava and effects. I think that's a good thing though since I could feel myself wanting to paint something else lol.

One thing I'll try next time is starting with a white primer and work my way to black. That would help in creating the really "hot" lava effect.

The sword was a new test for me. I started with a little boltgun over the symbols followed by a fade in of fire around the blade edge. From there I went over it again with Dwarf Bronze to give it a type of golden fire look. The pic doesn't do it justice, though, it came out pretty cool.

The Helmet side armor was faded from TinBitz to Boltgun Metal and highights with Mithril Silver.

Next project: I'm going to take a break from painting and focus on terrain again. Right now I'm sketching out a few ideas and plan to have the inital ideas up soon. Aside from that I have a few green stuff models to finish too lol.