The New Year is here and that means new beginnings, new opportunities and most importantly new hobby projects! For this year’s Tale of Gamers we’re also going to be mixing things up a bit and running a 3 round league at the same time. At 1k, 1.5k and 2k everyone will be throwing down with their new armies for that most important reward: Bragging Rights! (and a cool custom trophy)
Sadly, Covid reared it’s ugly head again this month and we got put back into lockdown. So while that does mean we won’t be playing games anytime soon everyone did have plenty of time to get their hobby on. Lets see what they’ve been working on!
Alex: The first thing I got finished this month wasn’t actually painting based at all. It was a tutorial for how I’m doing the red armour for my Blood Angels. I’d got all the photography done last month but didn’t have a chance to write it up so if that’s something you’d be interested in you can check it out here:
Tutorial: Blood Angels Armour
After that it was onto painting up this months entry which was a unit of Bladeguard Veterans:
These were one of my favourite models from the Indomitus set so I just had to include some in my army. Thanks to their Stormshields and 3 wounds Bladeguard are a really durable unit but they are quite slow. However, this does makes them perfect for pushing into and securing the mid board while the rest of my fast moving assault units fly off to do what Blood Angels do best.
With those completed I actually had some time left over so instead of getting a head start on next month I thought I’d finish off a unit I’ve had for a while now.
Scouts took a bit of a hit with the new Codex as they changed from Troops to an Elites Choice. They’re still a cheap objective grabber/ action monkey unit though and with their Infiltrating ability I’m sure I’ll find a use for them.
Next month will see me working on a unit of Company Veterans aswell as a crucial character for any Blood Angels list, a Sanguinary Priest.
Army Progress:
Models Completed : 14
Total Points: 450
Pledge for next month: A Sanguinary Priest and a unit of Company Veterans.
Si: “I’m not here to teach you to be Space Marines. By Russ and the Allfather you already know how to be that. “I’m here to teach you how to be Wolves and I’m not going to make it easy for you.” – Brannak Frostpelt addressing his new Pack of Assault Intercessors
So here we are at month 2! Been a tough month for me with some illness but happy I was still able to get my commitment finished. For this unit I really wanted to delve into the lore and one of my favourite things about the Space Wolves is the Wolf Guard training up new Aspirants. I loved the story in the Ragnar Blackmane book and wanted to use that in the new world. In my future I image that fresh Primaris are still delivered to the Wolves as the battles get fierce and Cawl keeps making them. Fenris will still provide worthy recruits but the wars are getting more intense and the Wolves will always be at the front fighting. So a crop of fresh Primaris arrives and whilst the Wolves know they can fight they need to learn the ways of Fenris to fit in with the others.
So here is Wolf Guard Brannek Frostpelt, equipped with a Master Crafted Thunderhammer leading his new Pack. He’s kept his Wolf Guard symbol on his knee and has his new Pack’s symbol on his arm.
This months pledge is a Unit of Aggressors and if time allows a Mystery Character (all will be revealed…I hope)
Army Progress:
Models Completed : 14
Total Points: 594
Pledge for next month: A unit of Aggressors.
Tange: Well, as per last year, I decided on an ambitious pledge for Month Two of Tale of Gamers. Last year I was working on Harliquins and pledged a full Troupe and two Starweavers… on the shortest month of the year… and obviously I fell flat on my face by not even getting the two Starweavers basecoated, let alone fully painted.
This year I learned from my mistakes by pledging just a squad of Breachers… and two Piranhas… on the shortest month of the year… learning was never my strong point. Unlike last year though, I’ve actually managed to get over the line this time around! So if nothing else goes my way at least that’s a small victory for me in 2021.
So I decided to paint my Piranhas predominantly dark metallic grey with red accents, similar to the infatry colours. This is to let the Battlesuits in my army with their mainly bright red colour scheme stand out on the battlefield.
In the grand scheme these two rocket powered bobsleds aren’t in the bright red colours of their Battlesuit bretheren. They will not be winning the day with glorious & heroic tactics, No! They will be grabbing early midfield objectives, harassing chaff troops and probably suicide tagging any dangerous shooty units in the opponents army.
Completing the Breacher squad this month has now filled my infantry quota for the initial 1,000pts of this army. I’ve sketched out a rough list to kick off the league with and now I just need a transport to carry these plucky underdogs into battle and some leaders to lead them. Oh and some bodyguard Battlesuits to make sure my HQ choices don’t get atomised on turn one.
Army Progress:
Models Completed : 18
Total Points: 410
Pledge for next month: Commander Farsight & Shas’o Maestro’el Shinys’wordso (Heap, you might just want to put Coldstar Commander? Alex: Nah, that’s good)
Rhaz: Well February is an extra short month so I must say I felt the pressure a bit. I didn’t even have time to work on any sneaky side projects… Even with the low model I count, I’m finding myself taking my time a lot more with this project, trying to paint every model to the best of my ability.
The first unit I finished were 5 Prosecutors. I’m a big fan of the Sisters of Silence aesthetic so I was really glad to include these. I think they will be good as a cheap unit to go and ‘do a thing’. I’m reasonably happy with how these turned out; but I may have to paint a unit with swords next time as they just look cooler.
Next, I painted 3 Allarus Custodians – well 2 and a Vexillus Praetor. I promise I’ll be painting some more Allarus in the next couple of months so I will have a full unit plus some extra. While painting I became conflicted about which weapon loadout to use, so I decided to paint a Vexillus instead. Plus who doesn’t love painting individual rope pleats, right?
Next month I will be cleaning up some resin and painting my first Forgeworld unit – some Venetari. I haven’t had the best experience with resin in the past. The Forgeworld Custodes stuff is just too cool to leave out though.
Army Progress:
Models Completed : 13
Total Points: 640
Pledge for next month: 3 Venetari Custodians
Kev: This month let me introduce you to my Warboss on Bike, Snagga Hoofstompa. He is pretty much the original idea for this army. I’ve always been a lover of both Snakebitez and Speedfreeakz so Boar Boyz seemed like a must especially with the availability of Gore Gruntaz in AoS. For the conversion I used bits from a Necron Tomb Blade and a bomb from the Ork Dakkajet. I have 3 or 4 such conversions planned and hopefully they will come out just as well!
I will be kitting ‘Da Boss’ out with the Killer Klaw relic for the flat 3dmg and no -1 to hit, Da Biggest Boss for the 4++ and the Ard as Nails Warlord Trait for +1T. This will hopefully make him last long enough to get some krump’n done.
I did make a few mistakes on the boss. The first one being although modeling a dust cloud sounded ace in theory, when coming to paint it I just couldn’t get my head around painting a red dust cloud. I may come back to that at a later date when I’ve figured it out. I don’t think it’s ever a bad thing doing models to the best you can and hoping future you will take it to the next level. The second one was the armour. With the first month I was learning and getting used to using an airbrush but I kept getting dodgy spray. I didn’t want to risk it here so I opted for the brush instead. I am happy with him but it wasn’t quite the clean but rusty lines I was aiming for.
After that I spent about 4 days here and there practicing with the airbrush on random models. I was trying to get my cleaning method down as I was pretty certain that was my issue. It took a while but eventually I was happier with how to handle the airbrush so it was onto the next model: Mr Stompie.
The result was possibly my best painted model to date. There’s always room for improvement but if I manage to stay at this level of painting for the rest of my hobby I’d be very happy. This guy’s armed with 2 Clawz and 2 Sawz so he’s going to be great in close combat. Also thanks to the Orkymatic Pistons Stratagem for +3 movement and re-roll Advances he’ll still be really fast.
Nearing the end of painting this guy I dropped a pot of paint covering most of the armour bits. Luckily I had done some sub-assemblies so it was fairly easy to strip and re-do them. One of the bonuses of Orks is they are pretty rustic so some mistakes I could work into the paint scheme.
Army Progress:
Models Completed : 18
Total Points: 429
Pledge for next month: A unit of 5 Meganobz
Dean: Last time I had yet to get the Death Guard Codex, a situation that has now been remedied.
So lets go over the plan now it’s shaping up. I knew I was going to need a Sorcerer, and we’ll get to him in a second, but I’ve also been able to settle on my most likely Plague Company, The Ferrymen of Nurgle. This has meant I’ve been able to get a rough design concept in my head for what I’m going to do, both visually and as a play style. The ability to slow those I’m fighting against opens up a lot of doors for a slower blocker force.
I wanted to make my army a batch of big, brutal looking, monsters and so that brings us to Kargo Murnal: the Thrice Slain. I put quite of bit of work into getting this beast to look the part. Using about 4 or 5 kits to get the end result: A sorcerer to scale with Typhus with a casual corpse in hand.
Getting the Obliterator and Cataphractii kits to blend took a bit of green stuffing. In the end I’m happy with how it’s turned out though. The sculpting on this to get the unique vibe was pretty enjoyable and convinced me to do more of it in the near future. The colour scheme also pops in quite a nice fashion and will feed into the next pledge.
In addition to the Thrice Slain I’ve also painted up my first Plagueburst Crawler. This kit was really rewarding to paint as every little detail and smear I added just furthered the detail. I really had fun painting all the little tiny bubbles and eyes.
I’m pretty sure I’m going to have at least one more of these. Not least because they are a solid choice tactically speaking.
The army will likely be a host of Terminator armoured Marines, Pox Walkers and some support vehicles. I’ve also done some prep work on sculpting my own take on another pretty well-known unit. You’ll have to stick around to see more though.
Army Progress:
Models Completed : 4
Total Points: 535
Pledge for next month: 10 Pox Walkers
What’s on your painting table at the moment? Started a new army of your own recently? Let us know in the comments.
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