Converting Recon Marines and Chaplain Dreadnoughts

Just a quick post to show some building / converting I have done over the past two weeks: A small squad of Recon Marines with Nemesis Bolters, ready to be painted as a part of a small Raven Guard allied detachment for my Horus Heresy Blood Angels. And two Castra Ferrum Dreadnought, both of them the venerable Chaplain Dreadnought sculpt from ForgeWorld.

Pict 1469: Raven Guard Recon Marines (Conversion)

Pict 1470: Raven Guard Recon Marines (Conversion)

I had quite a few ideas floating around in my head after last month's campaign day. But one that just had to be done was to convert some Recon Marines with Nemesis Bolters. They do seem quite useful in the game and just look great! I plan to paint them as a small Raven Guard allied detachment – a small part of the shattered legion that lend their skills in forward deployment to my Blood Angels.
The models were converted using the plastic Mk VI marines. I removed some detail on the chest armour and replaced it with detailing reminicent of the Raven Guard Dark Furies. The cloaks are made with Green Stuff – at fist only the rough shape before attaching the backpack. Once that had cured I added smaller whisps of Green Stuff to the edges to make them look less uniform and lastly texturing them with a layer of Vallejo Plastic Putty roughly stippled on to hide some of the seams that I could not iron out. The Nemesis Bolters use parts of the Grey Knight's Interceptor backpacks – using the longer teleporter rods to extend the barrels and the shorter ones to create a sight on top.

Pict 1471: Mk IV Chaplain Dreadnoughts (WIP)

Whilst converting I also worked on this pair of Chaplain Dreadnoughts. Both of them are eBay rescues and one of them was in a somewhat sorry state. The one with Lascannon will be part of my Howling Griffons to represent Chaplain Dreadnought Armand Titus that was part of force that participated in the Badab War. The other one had a bit more surgery done to make it fit in more with my Heresy Blood Angels, most notably I used a Dremel to make space for one of the Forge World Mk IV Blood Angels helmets. I really enjoyed posing these two. Whilst the boxy frame can feel a bit clumsy I'm very happy with what I came up with – one of them braced on a rock to surveil the battlefield, the other leaning forward to get ready for close combat. I plan to paint at least one of them for this year's Dreadtober. Will I manage to paint both of them?

Meltas for all the Blood Angels

In the past few weeks, I was quite productive and finished up another set of Horus Heresy Blood Angels. With these under my belt, I also got around to some more Howling Griffons, that lay around for about a year.

Pict 1454: Blood Angels Melta Support Squad

Pict 1455: Blood Angels Melta Support Squad

Pict 1456: Blood Angels Melta Support Squad

I did not quite finish these Blood Angels in time for last week's Campaign day, but they were far enough to see play. After three amazing games, my mind was fired up with new ideas for my Heresy marines. And I really wanted to finish the Melta Support Squad, the Rhino and the two characters. Doing the highlighting took some time, especially glazing the red armour, but I'm very happy to have done it now. I love the way the heat bloom looks on the squad's Melta guns.

Pict 1457: Blood Angels Rhino

Pict 1458: Blood Angels Rhino

Pict 1459: Blood Angels Rhino

Pict 1460: Blood Angels Rhino

The Support Squad also got their dedicated transport of a Rhino. Again using the Mars pattern but with the ForgeWorld Icon on one side and an additional icon on the back hatch. The big flat panels of the vehicle really lend themselves to weathering such as scratches. Really god fun to paint up!

Pict 1461: Blood Angels Moritat and Boarding Marine

Pict 1462: Blood Angels Moritat and Boarding Marine

The Moritat did get to do a bit in Zone Mortalis, winning me one game by running down the enemy Warlord. They even improved over the games, since there was a character experience system in place. I was originally not perfectly happy with the pose, especially the sword is quite hidden. But theay have grown on me and I can't wait to use them in some more games.
The Boarding Marine came out great as well. I painted them up to fit into my Breacher squad but I guess they will see litte time on the gaming table. It's really a shame that there is no regular way to kit out a Breacher squad with melee weapons.

Pict 1463: Howling Griffons Veterans purging a Zone Mortalis

Pict 1464: Howling Griffons Veterans

After finishing the Blood Angels, I got right onto another set of Space Marines and finished up six more Howling Griffons that I started last October. I said back then, that the highlights should not take long. And in fact I managed to do it during the course of a morning – only about a year later... Nevertheless, I'm very happy with the way they came out. They are a bit rougher than the Blood Angels – perfectly fitting for smaller games set during the Badab War!

Pict 1465: Blood Angels Kharybdis Assault Claw (WIP)

One last thing, the campaign day inspired me to do, was to stick together this Kharybdis Assault Claw. Its a massive beast, weighing in at pretty much exactly one kilogram of ForgeWorld resin! I purchased the Kharybdis used and took it apart at the start of the year. And having now put it together and even started basecoating it, I'm super happy with it and can't wait to get it to th tabletop once more. (Of course it saw about five minutes of game time before getting shot out of the sky...)

Getting into Alkemy with the Rados Cults

Progress has slowed quite significantly with both the Real Life™ and the summer getting in the way of building and painting. I did, however, manage to paint up a starter set for Alkemy the Game choosing the Rados Cult faction during last year's Kickstarter for the Second Edition rules. I also started working on a few more reinforcements for my Heresy Blood Angels and I hope to field them at a campaign kick-off event later this month.

Pict 1450: The Rados Cults lead by Radamante

Pict 1451: Rados Cults Starter Set

Pict 1452: Rados Cults Starter Set

So, this is my version of the Rados starter set. The team consisting of one hero, a priestess and 4 warriors with different specialisations. Having played a few rounds I already love the game. It playes on a small board – easily doable on a kitchen table – and has interesting tactical interactions between activation points, custom dice and a bluffing mechanic with cards to resolve combats.

I did ejoy painting these six miniatures to get back into the swing of things. While the process is pretty straight forward, I also wrote it down as a guide for anyone interested or to remind myself should I need it later. I am particularly happy with the bases. While they are similar to the ones I do for my Infinity miniatures, I managed to put a bit more details and other textures in as well.

I'm really looking forward to expanding my collcetion here – even with a newer faction such as the Rados, there is a really good selection of other heroes, warriors and even monsters to choose from and to change up the game play!

Pict 1453: Heresy Blood Angels Melta Support Squad, Moritat and Rhino (WIP)

One of the best motivations to finish miniatures is an upcoming event. I plan to get to a kick-off event for a campaign at one of the local stores.We will be playing games of Zone Mortalis as well as regular Heresy and for the latter I wanted some anti-armour unit to do work against tanks and elite units. Instead of going with the ubiquitous Lascannon squad I went with a Melta support squad a Rhino to get them to where they are needed most. And while I had the fitting paints out, I also stared with a Moritat to join my Mortalis Destroyers as well as a Boarding Marine. The latter was a prize at the Zone Mortalis tournament at the start of the year and I wanted to paint it up before this next event at the same location.

For now, the Rhino has the base colours as well as the decals and is ready for the oilwash. The infantry has some of the colours but will get the rest of them over the next few evenings.

More Legions Imperialis Blood Angels and a Big Terrain Feature

These past two weeks, I mainly painted some more Blood Angels for my Legions Imperialis collection, finishing up the Missile Support Marines from the last post and putting some good work into my flyers. In the bigger scale, I also worked on the base colours for a Zone Mortalis board.

Pict 1444: Legions Imperialis Blood Angels on the Defense

Pict 1445: Legions Imperialis Blood Angels Missile Launcher Support Marines

First up, I finished the Missile Launcher Support Marines for Legions Imperialis. The eye lenses were a bit tricky since they are not only incredibly small but also hidden behind the arms holding up the launchers. Nevertheless I'm quite happy with them! They even got to feature in another game, in which they did less than usual, but still were a menace. I do hope to get through the remainder of the infantry at a similar rate. In batches of four they don't take that long and, what's more, they don't drive me insane by the sheer number of them!

Pict 1446: Legions Imperialis Emplacement

Pict 1447: Legions Imperialis Emplacement

I also painted up this small scrach built emplacement in the small scale to add something more to my photos of LI miniautures. Its made from some plastic scrap, a LI Sicaran turret, a 28mm Razorback Lascannon and a few random bits. I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out – it is simple, but that means it wont take away from the miniatures I want to photograph along side it.

Pict 1448: Aeronautica / Legions Imperialis Blood Angels Air Force (WIP)

I also got to do some work on a bunch of flyers for my Legions Imperialis / Aeronautica Collection. The decals really do some heavy lifting to add details without having to paint them. And once the oilwash is on there, the model starts to come together. I already painted in the canopies and adding some highlights to the details as well as the bigger black and red surfaces should not take that much longer!

Pict 1449: Zone Mortalis Reactor (WIP)

Lastly I also invested a few evenings to work on some more 28mm terrain, in this case a tile for my Zone Mortalis board. While I played a few games of Heresy ZM at a club and I would really like to do that with my own collection, for now, these will probably be used in smaller skirmish style games such as Inq28 or even Necromunda. I love Mortian's reactor as a center piece - it practically paints itself. The GW board, however, does take some patience to fill in all the grey panels. As with the flyers, I'm very much looking forward to putting oils on the terrain piece and weathering it up with some pigments!

Catching up: Legions Imperialis, an Ent and more Badab Enforcers

Summer has almost begun and travels, the good weather and the Real Life™ have taken their toll on my hobby time. While I did not paint that much since my last post (Six weeks ago! I do apologize!), I was not idle but managed to build quite a lot for my Legions Imperialis Blood Angels, play a few games and work on other, smaller projects.

Pict 1440: Legions Imperialis Drop Pods and Fast Attack (WIP)

First up, I built and primed a set of Dreadnought Drop Pods as well as two sets of the Legion Fast Attack box. I will have to get another box of the former and I'm once again very impressed with the detail on these small miniatures. I also got to use some of them in a game already and I was quite impressed with the Jetbikes – they have quite the output with their bolters!

Pict 1441: Legions Imperialis Missile Launcher Support Marines (WIP)

Speaking of games - these Missile Launcher Support Marines do put in the work every time. Their ability to ignore cover makes them great at clearing out infantry out of buildings. Because of that I decided to make them the next few miniatures to finish up.

Pict 1442: Ent (Reposed)

Whilst building the Legions minis, I also reposed this plastic Ent to fill out my Fangorn collection. I think this one will be painted up as a birch. There is a bit of variety in the kit – but I feel like it does show its age and the poses you can get out of it just stock are limited. Nevertheless with a bit of wire and Green Stuff you can get them to be a bit more dynamic.

Pict 1443: Badab Enforcers Subjugators and Tauros Venator (WIP)

Lastly I found some second hand Subjugators for my Badab Enforcers and also got one of the Tauros Venators for the group. A lovely kit and I'm very much looking forward to painting them all up!

Treebeard and Orcs

Long time no see! Man, the real-life did take over for a few weeks there... Still, I managed to finish Treebeard as well as two more Mordor Orcs to play at a tournament. I also did some more work on a load more Orcs and Warg Riders as well as building some more reinforcements for my Legions Imperialis Blood Angels.

Pict 1433: Treebeard

Pict 1434: Treebeard

Pict 1435: Treebeard

I love this older metal version of Treebeard! I like it better than the new one, because you can see how it was done by hand with putty. He does look a bit small in comparison with the Forge World Quickbeam, but he still towers over the normal infantry of MESBG. Once again, adding the foliage really brought the model to life! Playing the three Ent heroes with Merry and Pippin on Treebeard's back at the tournament was great fun even if some match ups were not optimal.

Pict 1436: Mordor Orcs

Pict 1437: Mordor Orcs

These two Mordor Orcs with shield and spear were the missing pieces to get my Black Gate army up to 500 points for the tournament. In the end I did not play the list at all, but I'm pretty happy with the paint jobs. The conversions are a bit older, but alright. If I was to do them now, I'd probably try and use the superior metal Orcs as the base. Still, I really like the looted Númenor shield with the eye of Sauron painted over it!

Pict 1438: Mordor Orcs, Warg Riders and Sharkû (WIP)

While I painted the two Orcs I needed, I also pulled out a smattering of similar miniatures – some more Orcs and the Warg Riders, I keep putting of. I added in Sharkû and Wild Warg Chieftain into the latter ones. They all are now basecoated and washed and hopefully wont take to long to highlight.

Pict 1439: Legions Imperialis Drop Pods and Land Raider Proteus Explorers

Now, since there were a few more miniatures released for Legions Imperialis, I had to get a load of the Drop Pods to add to my Blood Angels. These are really lovely models! I am in love with the fact that they work exactly like the 28mm versions. From a gameplay perspective it would have been nice, to get more of them in a box and sacrifice the movable parts. Nevertheless, while I will play with them, I love them this way from a modelling perspective.

Great Fangorn Forest to high Orthanc hill, shall come against him

Six more miniatures finished to show this time around: I painted up Quickbeam the Ent for a tournament coming up in April and then put the finishing touches on a squad of Infinity minatures I had laying around from last year.

Pict 1426: Quickbeam the Ent

Pict 1427: Quickbeam

Pict 1428: Quickbeam

First up is Quickbeam, one of the newer models available for the Middle-earth Strategy Battle Game. I am really happy with the different tones I managed to put on him to change up the somewhat monotonous brown you often see on Ents. The 3d sculpted texture was a bit bland for my taste, but once the green flock was on he really came together.

Pict 1429: Ghulam Infantry, Kaplans, Al'Hawwa

These Infinity miniatures were another project that got left behind last year. After watching the new Dune movie I got the itch to finish them. They were only missing the faces and some highlights and the finishing touches were done over a few weekday evenings. I'm pretty happy with them and there are a few more miniatures in my collection that would fit this Kaplan / Qapu Khalqi theme. But I fear, they will be postponed until I manage to get a game in.

Pict 1430: Treebeard (WIP)

For now, there are some more Middle-earth figures to do for an upcoming tournament in April. One of them is this treebeard here. Since Quickbeam went pretty quickly, I hope to finish Treebeard soon as well. Of course he's carrying Merry and Pippin who will need some more attention, but I'm looking forward to it!

Pict 1431: Neferata on foot (Conversion)

Pict 1432: Neferata on foot (Conversion)

Lastly, whilst I had some green stuff mixed up to fill the gaps on Treebeard, I also finished this conversion of Neferata on foot. Since last I showed her, I filled the gaps between the two kits I used and resculpted parts of the skirt that were damaged during the construction. Hardest was to figure out how to connect the long and flowing sleeves to the back of her dress (the mounted version hides this with her throne). I'm pretty happy with the result and look forward to painting her!