JohnR's Month 6 - Leader Month (263.5points)

Evening all, super hectic month this month so only a few figs finished and I almost didn't even get them done!

 

This is my leader and a few of his retinue (read drinking cronies). There's 2 Diehard mini's 2 BOYL minis and a modern Copplestone in there. There were going to be more but...

Left to right they are Jak 'Luckless' Gibbs, 'Blot' Snake-tail, Captain Silas 'Silver' Ansell (captain of the pirate ship 'Lazarus' and leader of the army), Bartholomus 'Bart' Speirdyke (a rogue Navigator) and Eliza 'Red' Rythkil - Ansell's three armed bodyguard and lover.

Points.

All get frag and crack grenades plus the following:

'Luckless' Gibbs - Human Champion, Flak Armour, Sawn-off Shotgun, Laspistol 

'Blot' Snake-tail - Human Minor Hero, Mesh Armour, 2 Autopistols

'Silver' Ansell -  Human Major Hero, Mesh Armour, Refractor Field, Power Sword 2 Laspistols

'Bart' Speirdyke - Human Champion, Laspistol, Refractor Field, Level 1 Psyker

'Red' Rythkil - Human Minor Hero, Mesh Armour, 3 Laspistols, Vortex Grenade

Total = 263.5 points

Well, I managed to struggle over the line this month and finish the challenge. I've just worked a seven day stint and we're not even into the silly season yet so army photos will have to wait for next month!

Take care y'all.

Ben's Blood Drinkers - Wildcard Month

For the last official month of the challenge, I decided to make the army a bit less generic with a couple of special characters, another Medic (I decided the Blood Drinkers would need a lot of apothecaries to, ahem, administer 'necessary supplies'), and finally a Librarian.

First, to accompany the1st Company veterans I painted earlier, chapter heroes Sergeant Clovis and Apothecary Corbulax:

Secondly, here accompanying the 5th Company Devastators and Captain I painted earlier, an additional Apothecary and Librarian:

Clovis bears a fragment of the Shroud of Sanguinius contained within a stasis field generator - when it is deactivated, it sends the nearby sons of Sanguinius into a battle frenzy.  In background he's based on Veteran Sergeant Cleutin, who never recieved an official model.  The model is a converted Dark Angels Standard Bearer with a backpack from a Techmarine and a Servitor:

Corbulax is unconverted from Apothecary Corbulo (apart from drilling out the goblet and filling it with a PVA/paint mixture which is not visible from the pics:

The librarian is also unconverted, apart from a little greenstuff to open the pistol arm out:

The medic received an extra saw arm on the backpack, donated from a Chaos miniature:

Army list wise, this comes to 477 pts

Cleutin: 102 pts

Corbulo: 163 pts

Apothecary: 40 pts

Epistolary, Force Staff: 172 pts

Byron's Invasion of Ulthuan - GROM (373 or 441.5 points)

.....Grom?

                                                                                        ...Grom?

                                                                                Grom.

                            Grom!

            GROM!

GROM!! GROM!! GROM!!

This month, Grom has arrived! (Another picture FLIP o' RAMA.) Watch as the mighty Grom plows through the goblin rabble as he races toward the coming battle.

Next month, the invasion of Ulthuan will culminate in a mighty battle report as I recreate the Battle of Maugthrond Pass with my kids. 

Now for some pics of the minis

Grom (257 or 325.5 points)

I think my modeling choices for Grom warrant some explanation. I have an original copy of both Grom and Nibblet, but I don't much care for the original (4th edition anyway) Grom. I bought this Bequest Miniatures goblin, and he seemed to be intended as a Grom lookalike, so I used him. I like the energy of his musician, so I put a 5th edition wolf chariot standard-bearer pole in his hand. The wolves are Bob Olley wolves to match the army. The over-the-top cotton trailing from the wheels is meant to make him look like he is cruising really fast. The base is obviously a custom base. It is made from foamcore to match the frontage of the wolves, 3", and the standard depth of a chariot, 4". 

Here you can see the Starter Box artwork featuring Grom's banner

Why the points discrepancy?

Just like Eltharion, it depends if you use the Army Book or the Starter Box. 

If we reverse-engineer Grom's points from the scenario pamphlet we get that Grom costs 325.5 points. He comes equipped with Grom's axe, light armor, the Horn of Urgok, and his chariot, but Nibblet is not included, despite his appearance on the card standee. 

In contrast, in the Army Book he only comes with the Axe of Grom, and no horn. Instead, he has regeneration, and Nibblet appears as the army battle standard. All of this totals 257 points. 

And the goblin rabble: 116 points

Total: 373 or 441.5 points

I am lagging behind my ultimate goal of filling the entire shelf with goblins. Next month, I aim to do some catch-up. If I can average a goblin a day, then I can add another 30 goblins to the army. 

My priorities will be filling out my archers and spearmen to at least match the Starter Box numbers of 32 of each. I have another banner to paint up, a shaman, a familiar, and then just as many goblins as I can after that. Then, after all that, I will be done painting goblins for the foreseeable future. 

Filippo's Bretonnia - Rank and File 4 (195 pts)

The Crusades against Araby (1448 to 1451 IC)

In the year 470 (1448 IC), the war-torn southern realm of Estalia was invaded by Sultan Jaffar and the armies of Araby. Diplomatic envoys pleaded with Bretonnia to send aid, and the king sent a call to war out to all of Bretonnia. Throughout all the dukedoms, this call to war was heard, and countless knights pledged their lance to their king's holy cause. In his noble wisdom, King Louis the Righteous gave permission for warriors of the Empire to cross Bretonnia on their journey to Estalia, for they too had pledged their aid, despite the lack of unification during the Age of Three Emperors. This military campaign has since been named the Great Crusade, in homage of the zeal of these warrior-knights.

Within time, the armies of Jaffar were pushed back by the more mobile and heavily armoured forces of the Crusading Knights, forcing him to relinquish his hold on most of Estalia. Retreating back to Araby, but leaving a token force of troops around the important city of Magritta, Jaffar's armies were hounded by the Bretonnians, who pursued them tirelessly. The Crusader army eventually reached the sandy beaches of Araby and invaded the major city and trade-port of Copher.

As the crusaders sailed with the aid of Estalian ports and Tilean warships, Jaffar and his men prepared for the coming invasion by fortifying most of the major sea-ports. When they finally arrived in the spice-trading city of Copher, it was heavily fortified and the defenders were well prepared for the coming battle. Yet they weren't prepared for the wrath of the northern kingdoms that Jaffar had brought upon them, and once the defenders first started faltering against the onslaught of knights and siege towers, a breach was made and soon the high spires of Copher were pulled to the ground and much of the population were put to the sword.

Not even the harsh desert conditions could perturb the knights, and their fervour very slowly took its toll on Jaffar's warriors as many desert tribes under Jaffar's control began growing tired of this war of attrition. Despite Jaffar having a vastly larger army than the crusaders, Jaffar's armies began to disband, for many of the tribes of Araby grew weary of the despot's incompetence. After frustrating months of minor skirmishes, the Bretonnians faced Jaffar at the Battle of El Haikk.

Elemental spirits of the deep deserts were summoned to fight alongside Jaffar's armies, and with their numerical superiority, they overwhelmed the outnumbered crusaders on all sides. Just when all hope seemed lost and the army was almost at the breaking point, a host of both Empire and Bretonnian knights charged furiously at the tightly packed army, mowing down the lightly armoured soldiers until finally the armies were scattered by the sudden death of Jaffar by a Bretonnian lance. Disliking the harsh, dry lands, for it proved too vast and hostile to be completely conquered, the Bretonnians sailed back home, with cargo-ships laden with exotic goods and treasures, whilst the Empire knights remained behind to hunt down the remnants of Jaffar's army for another century, which would eventually lead to the creation of several more knightly orders.

Imagine.. wearing a heavy armour over a padded gambeson, a great helm on the head an surcoat on the armour, riding a barded horse under the scorching sun of Araby.

Almost as hot as the weather now in Italy.

This month has been the toughest so far, with little time and condition not great for painting, but still a little progress has been made.

I (almost) painted a small unit of Knights of the Realm. Almost painted because I over estimated my ability to paint the heraldy. It's still beyond me. 

Such a glorious sight

Unfortunately I do not have the original decals, but there are some great options I can buy online, just not in time for this month.

With this unit the project is completed! Not as much as I wanted but still another small army I can play with.

I'll be back in july with some addition, now that I have a little bit more than the core 500 point army I can easily add something to reach 1000 points (and comment on the other splendid armies posted!)

See you in July!

George's Imperial Guard, Leader, Month 6

Colonel Audacian was growing impatient. He had spent his entire career winning. Conquering worlds, reclaiming imperial outposts from heretics. And throughout he had kept his men alive. An unusual feat for an imperial commander.

But now the imperial authorities had grown suspicious and they were testing his loyalty with an order to send his men to almost certain death.

Audacian stood and watched the massed ranks marching past towards the heavily defended heretic fortifications. He felt the cold stare and the mirthless smile of the commissar behind him.

But he wasn’t going to abandon his men now. Without warning, he raised his sword and charged.

I had great fun painting these glorious lead minis, mainly Mark Copplestone command figures, and the commissar a beautiful gift from fellow Challenger Graeme. Thanks Graeme!

It felt great to crack out some bright colours again (I do love bright colours!) I was inspired by Mike Mcvey's Warhammer 40,000 painting guide from 1993. He used lots of red hats and helmets, so I went for it and thoroughly enjoyed it! I like the contrast with the drab tones from the rest of the regiment. 

It was insanely hot while I was painting and I was slow, even by my own slow standards! So I will be using my final month to add the flags and banners that the original John Blanche artwork deserves!

June Points:

Command Section: 280 points

Commissar: 45 points

June Total: 325 Points

Army Total:

Command section: 280 points

Commissar: 45 points

Support squad: 425 points

2 x Tactical squads: 400 points

Army Total: 1,150

Colonel Audacian and his command! Sinister commissar courtesy of Graeme!

Audacian leads his regiment into battle!

Paul's Dwarf Army June Leader Month

 The last two months have been pretty hectic and having the time to sit down and do any painting has been a bit of a luxury. As a result I had to skip last months post. However, I have managed to get a little bit more on track and this month can show my leader, a fine sculpt in an action pose with his foot on the severed head of a green skin. The quality of finish on this model is probably the highest I have achieved for this army. I am very pleased with the way that he has turned out. 

As well as the leader of the hold I have managed to get a cannon fully painted and the crew almost painted up. Once again the NMM approach has produced a nice final result but was very time consuming. It probably didn't help that I tried to show all the wood grain on the cannon body and then opted to add a highlight to that as well. To tie the war machine in with the rest of the army I originally painted the wheels yellow and black stripes but I wasn't happy with the final result and ended up stripping and re-painting them as you can see in the photo below. 

This is one of two cannons, the other which is almost finished. The crew are almost complete but still have little bits and pieces that need doing. The second cannon and all six crew will be ready for final overview next month. Below shows the current state of the crew so far. 

Adding to my spearmen (which I showed in a previous post) I have managed another six models including a full command of champion, musician and banner bearer. 

I am especially pleased with the banner bearer and the banner pole which was mainly due to the influence of Frogbug who insisted that I do a stripey maypole effect on it. I was reticent to do this but I have to admit it does look pretty good and was a motif I carried on to the next unit finished for this month. Below is a close up of the banner bearer.

At the start of the challenge I had lots of models which I had acquired from a friend many years ago after we exchanged armies. I had some 40K imperial guard which I passed over for the dwarves. Amongst these were what I had thought to be dwarf clansmen but after starting the challenge and purchasing the 4th edition codex I realised that they were longbeards. These were too good not to get a coat of Deep Sea Blue and Volcanic Yellow so they joined the production line.  Below you can see the unit without shields. 

The biggest pain with these guys were the shields which took an age to paint. I'm still not happy with them and will need to revisit them and neaten up the final result. I initially painted up the shields with a Yellow Field as you can see from the photo below. However, when you put them against the minis I'm not sure that it works so I then painted up a shield with a black field. I'm still trying to make my mind up before I commit to gluing them to the models.

As I like gun line armies I added another 10 Thunderers to join the first unit. I believe that some of these sculpts may predate the thunderers shown in the army book. I have to admit that I like the variety in sculpt as I wasn't going for. mono-pose army with these guys. 

Finally, what Dwarves Hold would be complete without a unit of Quarrellers. I have a unit of twelve, all individual sculpts. I would like to get the final two sculpts which are illustrated in the army book but despite scouring the obvious sites I haven't been able to locate them. That's a job for the future. You can see the dirty dozen below.

Looking back at what I have just typed I have realised that there are a fair few models that are completed. The challenge has led to me developing techniques in order to get the army finished. Looking at the models as a collective I feel that the quality of finish on these later models isn't as refined as the earlier ones but in order to cater for volume of models something has to give. However, I believe that I have got better at adding details which cause the models to 'Pop' on the table and so when seen all together the sum of the parts is much greater than the individual models or units. 

A few units that I started painting and are in progress are a Runesmith and a Gyrocopter. I was desperately hoping to have them completed for this month but it wasn't to be. However, below is a photo of the current state and they will be completed before the end of July. 

Part of the reason that these aren't complete is the fact that I am not the most focused when working and I tend to jump around a lot as I have the attention span of a gnat. One of the things that I have loved about this forum is the creativity of the people involved. There are some amazing painters in this group but there are also some brilliant writers and scenery builders. Whilst I do not have the imagination or the literary skills of many in this blog I have been inspired by the scenery and display aids that are frequently on show. This has been both a blessing and a curse as it has led to me losing painting time as I have endeavoured to create a display board for the army. I'm trying to go for a more vertical look with models on lots of levels rather than the traditional 2' X 2' board that I would normally go for. Therefore I have made a start on some scenery. I have built a couple of dwarves towers and battlements together with a gate which needs the top completed. I'm hoping that these raw builds will be completed for the final round up next month but in case they aren't then here is the current state. I've included a couple of figures to give an idea of scale. 

Well that's it for now. It's 23.59 on the 30th June so this ic cutting it fine. Hope you like what you've seen.

Andrea's Space Elves - Vehicle month - June

 Hi OWACers, 

so we are at the last month, and for me this is the vehicle month!

I have got the possibility to 3D print a model of Wave Serpent, the old one: do you remember that goofy and strange vehicle taken directly from Epic? Yes, exactly that one!

Well, it is not exactly identical to the AmourCast one, but this is what I got ;-)

There is one think that I clearly remember about the Wave Serpent livery: the wave along the hull. So, I wanted to reproduce the same scheme on the mine. Since I suck at free-hand, I just designed and produced a template which helped me to draw precise wave lines onto the hull:

Basically, I first made a template of the area that will be occupied by the wave pattern; then, I digitalized it along with a ruler to keep proportion and successively print of the appropriate length. Once digital, I superimposed the wave pattern with a design program (each single wave is a separate layer, so I can make them of different sizes). Then, printed, cut out and reproduced on paper tape; the final step was to stick the paper tape template onto the hull and make the contour. Et voilá, waves are designed and painted. 

Ok, now I have my troops transport and can carry Banshees across the battlefield.

Now, the rules for using it. Maybe my google-fu start to be a little less reliable, but I can't find the original datafax and special rules on the web. I just got some instruction which, apparently, were translated in french and back-translated in english, and a picture of the original ArmourCast model EXACTLY ABOVE the original datafax... 

... it took to me some hours, but I think I have got correctly the rules and decided to make a new datafax.

And, of course, I made also the Warp Template (following instructions and by printing waves on transparent slides)!

Sorry for the non-backdrop, but the warp template is only visible on white...)

Ok, this is all for this month although I planned to paint more. Though, you know... family, work and a temperature up to 38˚ C (about100 F) do not help! I still have some more space elves, and maybe I will achieve completion by the wrap up post, but with this 150 points the minimum requested is done!

See you next month, ciao

A