Warhammer 40k #2 - Angels on Parade

Well Fridays 40k leak finally did it for me, I have been struggling to enjoy anything about Warhammer 40k the last year or so (Mostly because Age of Sigmar is so much easier and fun in comparison). With the leak of the new models for Gathering Storm III: Rise of the Primarch, well one of those models has got me really excited.

The Fallen Angel Cypher, leader of the Fallen Angels. I will be the first to admit that the other two are also nice models but Ultramarines and Grey Knights do nothing for me. My only gripe with this model is that he will getting a helmet as I'm not fond of the unarmoured marine head.

The Fallen Angel Cypher, taken from warhammer-community.com

My biggest hope is that along with Cypher, GS3 also has some rules for Cyphers fellow Fallen Angels, I'm optimistic regarding this due to there being several obvious Fallen Angels in the heresy era black power armour in the background of the leaked White Dwarf photo's.

Onto my own rabble of unpainted Dark Angels, its been a while since I have removed them from my cupboard of eternally unfinished models. I really should not be allowed to add to a collection till at least some of it has been blessed with at least 3 colours (Though I did at least prime all of these models in the correct colour intending to paint them over summer 2016, but then the Season of War happened). Although I have not counted in a while I believe I have around 5000 points

Angels on Parade

My intention was to paint the Greenwing as the 4th company, but when I get around to doing a few test models I shall practice a few of the company symbols then make my decision after then. Alternatively, I may paint all these Greenwing marines as members of the reserve companies then build a Battle Company from the ground up using parts from recent plastic Mk3 & Mk4 heresy era sets mixed in with the later Mk6 & Mk7 armour parts from the tactical squad set.

January 2017 Hobby Round-up or: How I Learned to Stop Procrastinating and Love the Brush

Anybody that knows me knows that painting aspect of wargaming is probably the part of the hobby I enjoy the least. To work towards completing my 2017 hobby resolutions I have just had to push myself to paint and to my own surprise (and my friends), I have really enjoyed it. The feeling of accomplishment due to finishing a unit of models is something I've not felt in such a long time that it has become almost addictive. Let's hope I keep it up!

This month I made a start on 1000 points of Deathrattle for Age of Sigmar, Completing 42 out of 77 models for the army and beating my goal of a model a day in January of 31. The first photo below is of my converted Wight King with Infernal Standard. He was made using the previously available Wight King from Forge World, I really like the original model but I feel the banner he originally was holding did not fit the theme of my skeletal legion. 

The next photo shows my converted Necrotect, I really like this unit supporting my Deathrattle army as its in-game abilities are really useful though I was stuck thematically as the official model before the range was removed by GW was a mummy. 5 short minutes later I had this thematically fitting conversion that I'm really happy with (and will probably make a second of).

 

Below are two blocks of 20 Skeleton Warriors armed with Swords and Shield. You will notice that they are a mix of the Vampire Counts Skeleton Warriors box and the old Tomb Kings Skeleton Warriors box. Before it went out of production I bought up as many of these boxes and other local hobbyists spare shields as I could, I much prefer the legionary look of these shields and icons in comparison to the rag-tag look of the VC shields and torn standards.

 

Plans for February

With February being a relatively short month in comparison to others my goal is 28 models. Going ahead I have 35 more models to add to the Deathrattle I painted this month to complete the army so I feel this is a workable goal. Alternatively I did get quite the haul of LotR SBG minis for Christmas 2016 and would like to start to make a dent to the crate of mini's I have in the backlog for LotR.

LotR SBG backlog crate

Blood Bowl #1 - Pre-Season Preparation

On Friday I was lucky enough to have played a game of the new incarnation of Blood Bowl from Games Workshop. Unfortunately for me as I was entering the world of wargaming from what I remember, games such as Blood Bowl were on their way out and I only every got to play it two or three times. This is one of the many specialist games I have wanted to play for absolutely years, luckily I managed to get my hands on an unopened Battlefleet Gothic starter box last year and now I'm able to play another of these highly praised games that has been incredibly hard to find an affordable copy of. 

Blood Bowl 2016 starter box

Of that brief game of Blood Bowl, I was luckily allowed to play I was surprised to find how similar in almost 90% of the game was to the recent PC releases of Blood Bowl. I was aware they were close but not as similar as they actually turned out to be.

The Reikland Reavers (Human Starter Team)

I fully intend to get two lots of this Blood Bowl starter box as I would like to paint up the first as the intended teams from the box, The Reikland Reavers and The Gouged Eye. The second will be used to come up with my own teams.

From finishing the starter set my plan is to branch out with the Death Zone league rules and come up with some of my own teams to form a small league with. As more and more teams are released, such as the soon to be released Skaven team they can be added as they are acquired. From what I can infer from screenshots of the Death Zone contents page its looks like season 1 as GW are calling it will have a total of 8 teams which are as follows; Human, Orc, Skaven, Dwarf, Nurgle, High Elf, Wood Elf and Dark Elf which should ensure quite an exciting first run of the game.

The Gouged Eye (Orc Starter Team)

Warhammer 40k #1 - Kill Team Michaelus WIP

My 197 point Blood Angels Kill Team is made up from a 6 man Sternguard Veteran Squad.

Veteran Sergeant Michaelus

The leader of the Kill Team, Veteran Sergeant Michaelus is armed with a Power Sword to hunt down any model on the board and not allow it an armour save. If I were to a campaign with this Kill Team I would make give Micaelus the Been there, Seen it, Done it Leader Trait to allow him to become a fourth specialist for the Kill Team specialising in combat. Specialising in combat would allow Michaelus to become a Warrior Adept gaining him an extra point in Weapon Skill.

Specialist Malthus

Guerilla Specialist Malthus, armed with a Heavy Flamer will be stalking through the ruins of the board using the Move Through Cover rule to quickly get the Heavy Flamer in range.

Specialist Turcio

Specialist Turcio is armed with a Storm Bolter and is a Weapon Specialist gaining the Reaping Volley rule which allows him to fire the two shots from the Storm Bolter at different targets. Combined with his specialist Sternguard ammunition I believe this could be a useful combo.

Specialist Danton

Specialist Danton is armed with a Missile Launcher in the hope of being able to fire at closely grouped models with his blast attacks. Danton is an Indomitable Specialist and so has gained the Relentless rule to be able to manoeuvre and both fire his weapon at full Ballistic Skill.

Brother Travis

Brother Travis' role is to lay supporting fire for the advancing parts of the Kill Team, he is armed with a Combi-Melta so is able to take care of any enemy armour that may appear on the battlefield.

Brother Julius 

Brother Julius like Brother Travis is armed just with a Combi-Melta.

My first day of painting consisted of getting the red Power Armour's colour correct. I started by spraying them Mepheston Red then washing Agrax Earthshade, from here I re-layered the Mepheston Red onto the flat open areas of the Power Armour. Finally to finish the Power Armour I did an edge highlight of Evil Sunz Scarlet on any edge that you can see from directly above the model.

Specialist Turcio, Specialist Danton, Brother Travis, Bother Julius,
Specialist Malthus and Veteran Sergeant Michaelus

I just took a quick crappy photo to be able to document my first day of work on the Kill Team, more to come soon.

Frostgrave #3 - Skeletons and Imps!

My first lot of creatures of Frostgrave turned out nice for such simple work. The Skeletons are GW's Tomb Kings Skeleton Warriors and the Imps are the goblins from GW's Escape From Goblin Town. These just happened to be mini's that I have knocking around the hobby cupboard that fortunately fits in the Frostgrave theme.

I have never liked those goblins from Escape From Goblin Town and I know it's not GW's fault that they look awful seeing as they had to design models to accompany the films aesthetic which I thought was poor the second they turned up in the film. Fortunately, I feel they work quite well as Imps / Lesser daemons due to how varied they all look physically.

6 Imps

Although I used mostly the newer Vampire Counts Skeleton Warriors because they look better against most other Warhammer mini's I love these goofy Tomb Kings Skeletons mainly for their cheesy grins. They defiantly do not fit in the semi-serious Age of Sigmar aesthetic they certainly have a home in my games of Frostgrave due to the slight comicalness their outlandish poses and big grins emanate.

8 Skeletons

I'm still working on some Armoured Skeletons and they are very close to completion and next would like to work on some animals like Giant Rats, Wolves and Bears.

Lord of the Rings SBG #1 - The Mines of Moria WIP

At the beginning of the summer, I was lucky enough to find a new in box Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game, Mines of Moria beginner box. I first owned this over 10 years ago and have since lost my original copy. When I saw this box at an affordable £30 I instantly decided to put on hold the hobby purchase I had been saving for that week and rushed home for a large dose of nostalgia.

Contents of Mines of Moria box game.

The Lord of the Rings SBG was always my favourite GW game growing up but unfortunately in my local club nobody ever played it, instead favouring almost exclusively WH40k. In the years since I have tried several times to restart this game and recently managed to pick up all of the old Sourcebooks in the hope that I could one day play through all of the scenarios in order and follow the adventure of Frodo and the other heroes on the tabletop from The Shire to the Cracks of Doom.

I have played through this box a few times now since purchase and as you would expect is quite simple to play and heavy in The Fellowships favour. Rather than make something up myself to change this instead I'm going to from this point play this box using the Balin's Tomb scenario from The Fellowship of the Ring sourcebook. This version of the scenario adds in 2 Goblin Captains for the Evil side, with these added heroes it gives the Goblins that little bit of added punch and dice manipulation to try and counter the 9 heroes of The Fellowship.

In regards to the hobby side of this box, I have managed to complete 6 of the 24 Goblins while the other 18 are in various stages of completion but should not take me too long if put some time aside for them.

6 of 24 Moria Goblins

I remember my original Fellowship models from this box looked just awful so I aim to redeem myself, this time around. I have for some reason two sets of the plastic Fellowship so am going to do a practice set of models then a set to use in the game with the second lot. Balin's tomb is something I'm also considering building as you get most of the terrain needed in the Mines of Moria box anyway, all I would need is a slab of wood in the correct size for the room and some polystyrene to make the walkways around the edge of the room and walls.

Age of Sigmar #6 - Celestial Vindicators Lord-Celestant

I have now had bare plastic Stormcast Eternals in my to-do pile since my beginnings in Age of Sigmar. I just could not decide on how I wanted to paint them, originally I was tempted by a Hallowed Knights army led by Tarsus Bull-Heart but wanted something I had not seen in my local area.

This past fortnight there had been a painting competition in my local Warhammer store with the only requirements being that you enter one model and it is no bigger than 50mm base footprint. After finishing my Nighthaunt I have wanted to push my painting skills up a level and so chose to paint a Lord-Celestant of the Celestial Vindicators as my entry.

Unfortunately, my entry was not finished in time for entering into the competition but I wanted to finish it anyway.

Celestial Vindicators Lord-Celestant

I had a ton of fun painting this model so much I have decided to make the Stormcast my active project for an upcoming Path to Glory campaign at this same local Warhammer store. A path to Glory campaign does not require a points value but as my goal for Age of Sigmar is to collect several 1000 point faction armies as not to over-collect one faction and also that I have a great variety of armies to play with.

My 1000 (1020) point Celestial Vindicators army is as follows;

Lord-Celestant

Lord-Relictor

Knight-Venator

5 Liberators with Hammer and Sigmarite Shield

5 Liberators with Hammer and Sigmarite Shield

5 Liberators with Hammer and Sigmarite Shield

5 Paladin Retributors

3 Prosecutors with Celestial Hammers

3 Prosecutors with Celestial Hammers

Age of Sigmar #4 - The Fell Souls of Stygzz

Well, this has been a long time coming. This is the first time in my 10+ years in the hobby that I have completed an army... You can call bullshit but if you knew me you would know how awful I am at staying on a project.

My finished army "The Fell Souls of Stygzz" are in no way Golden Demon or even Bronze Demon if such award were to exist but this really is a milestone for my hobby. Painting this army has gained Death 6 points in my store, with gaming giving me a few more too having not lost a game with them at 1000 points.

The whole army ready to battle!

Now these are done I have two more AoS projects to finish. I'm painting a Stormcast Lord-Celestant as a Celestial Vindicators for a painting competition in my local GW. I have never entered anything into a painting competition before because I know I'm not good enough to even place but I have 20 days to practice and improve my skills to hopefully stand out from the crowd of other entries.

The other project I'm undertaking with my girlfriend is a 1000 point Sylvaneth army with tonnes of the cool new models included. More to come on this project in a different post.

Age of Sigmar #2 - Nighthaunt Update

I hate to admit it, but I have painted more mini's this past week then I have in the past year or so. During university I really fell out with the hobby side, I just did not find painting the mini's fun. Coming out of that mindset has been very hard but the feeling of accomplishment in the hobby is something I have not felt till this past week, and I like it.

I will be the first to admit, I am not a good painter but I intend to improve from this point onwards. I managed to get to a quality I'm happy with 6 Spirit Hosts, 1 Tomb Banshee, 2 Cairn Wraiths and 10 Hexwraith Horses. I still have the Hexwraiths themselves to paint as well as 6 more Spirit Hosts but unfortunately, I'm currently out of white spray so I will need to go out and purchase some soon.

Tomb Banshee and Cairn Wraiths

 It's posted all over the Internet but in case you have not seen how to paint Spirit Hosts, its a wash of Nihilakh Oxide over a white primer then wash the recesses with the Waywatcher Green glaze. Simple.

First 6 Spirit Hosts

Age of Sigmar #1 - The Season Of War

Starting in a week or so is Games Workshops Season of War and with it 3 so called new ways to play Age of Sigmar. Now I don't have my General Handbook yet but via the multitudes of leaks I have been able to calculate a 1000 point Nighthaunt army to take part in my local GW's summer campaign.

Upon registering for the campaign you are given a small card to track your progress be it through gaming or hobby tasks. You also get a cool little badge to show which Grand Alliance you are a part of so naturally I took the Nagash badge. My girlfriend also registered and chose who I assume is an Alarielle badge.

Deciding to stay within the Nighthaunt allegiance I can make a legal army of just ghosts, which I'm quite excited for. Because of staying within the Nighthaunt allegiance Spirit Hosts become Battleline units. My 1000 points list is as follows.

1 Tomb Banshee

2 Cairn Wraiths

12 Spirit Hosts (2 groups of 6)

10 Hexwraiths

My Sigmar army since starting it in January has been neglected, I have barely painted any of it which works in my favour for gaining points in the campaign. I currently only have my Tomb Banshee and 3 Spirit Hosts close to being finished so it's going to be quite the push to finish these models at the rate I paint. Wish me luck!

This is the army as it sits today, it's not even fully built. My aim is to get it painted and based by the 7th of August for a 1000 point tournament at an LGS.