Jaakko and Forin - The Long Forgotten Squat Brotherhood - Wrap-up

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers. For he to-day that sheds his blood with me, shall be my brother.

- Henry V

 

...and suddenly another season of OWAC comes to an end! This season was somewhat heavier than the previous one but I'm very happy with the resulting army and the memories of blood, sweat and tears are already starting to turn golden. I didn't have enough time and momentum to finish everything I wanted and will probably continue to paint Space Stunties for another month or two and am enjoying it a lot at the moment. But that's enough talking, let's look at some pictures!

 The Long Forgotten Squat Brotherhood of Forin Leadenshield

 

Bikers ended up being my favourite part of the army and I wish to paint another squad of regular bikers and a biker Warlord at some point.

The thudd gun must be the my favourite heavy weapon in this project and, along with the mole mortars, something I always wanted to include in the Squat army to be.

It seems that I'm picking favourites from the pictures and the living ancestor is another one. A fun little decrepit thing. I have the sidecar riding variant in the painting que but unfortunately didn't have time to include it into the leader month

 

As you might have noticed I managed to get some painting done this month too. I really wanted to finish at least one tank and I'm pretty happy with how this Land Raider turned out. It took a lot of time to paint the monster with my teeny-tiny brushes and I'm considering getting an airbrush in the future. You can also try to find a new standard bearer and a chainsword wielding Squat from the middle part of the main army picture.

I've had this tank for ages and I'm super happy that it's finally painted. I decided to use the hammer with wings as a recurring motif on machines and vehicles and figured that a banner wouldn't stay pristine if attached to a tank and made it a bit rough.

This season in points:

The OWAC adjusted model count was used except for the Termite and Land Raider

 

What next?

As mentioned, I still have some Squats left to paint during the off season, but my thoughts are already turning towards OWAC VIII. I hope to take part in the next season if it's possible and have a few options in mind. I think I'd like to enter with a massive horde of orcs & goblins. On the other hand, I've always dreamt of a Bretonnian army, my dwarves really should be beefed up and I have some chaos dwarves and halflings in the pile of opportunity. Well, I quess we have to wait a few months and see what happens.

Finally, many thanks to Overlord Byron, to all members of the organizing committee and fellow challengers! Things have gone smoothly through the challenge and it was a pleasure to follow your projects again.

Hope to see you all next season!

Jaakko and Forin - Leader month

To guard against the misuse of Brotherhood troops by unscrupulous stronghold Lords, a Brotherhood force is always led by a close relative of the Lord, known as the Warlord. Under his personal command is a unit of the Hearthguard, drawn from the Lord's loyal retainers, who form an aristocratic class in the stronghold.

Warhammer 40.000 Compendium

And so the final month of painting for OWAC VII has passed! I had to finish ahead of time due to family holidays and didn't get to paint everything I would have liked, but, nevertheless, I'm very happy with this months output. It's a leader month so I spent most of the time painting leaders but managed to squeeze in some other models too and a small surprise.

I finished two sets of Warlords with their Hearthguards (one regular one and one in exo-armours), four Squat troopers, a Tarantula and a Termite tunneler to carry the exo-armoured heroes into battle. I ran out of tufts and my LGS didn't have the right kind so some of the bases are a bit minimalistic.

Warlord Forin Leadenshield with his Hearthguard. A land raider is allocated to these guys but I couldn't quite get it finished before time ran out. There's a bit more patina in the metals than with regular Squats as I figured their gear would be ancient artifacts.

 

These guys have access to a large variety of equipment but this one trusts the dreaded laspistol.

Next we have the still unnamed Warlord with his Hearthguard in exo-armours. I'm glad that I could find enough of these models to make a full set.

The power gamer's choice for leaders bursting out from a tunneler

I fell a bit short of painting a full Combat Squad and it needs a further four models. This unit will be a close assault one and I have a nearly finished chainsword wielding Squat to join these guys.

 

Vollmer Adams leads the squad with an iron fist

 

Gunner Karl equipped with a multi-melta. He will stay in the rhino while his mates charge the enemy with their pistols and chainswords. I modelled a rhino with a hatch mounted multi-melta (as in the art piece by Paul Bonner) to represent this but it's still only partially painted.

 

Krag Jorgensen kindly gifted to this project by George

 

Smoothbore Sten

 

This Tarantula was kindly gifted to this project by Graeme. There's no such thing as too many heavy weapons in a Squat force.

In the very end of May I found out that Ramshackle games makes tunneler models. I've always liked the Epic scale Squats and had to include one tunneler in the force. Luckily the delivery was fast and I managed to finish this one in time.

I figured it's a Termite class tunneler. There are no rules for these things but I thought to use the rules below for them (which are essentially the Rogue Trader landing pod rules with the word tunneler substituted for landing pod).

Tunneler assault:

Roll for each tunneler at the beginning of your turn. A score of 5 or 6 indicates that it emerges somewhere on the table. A score of 1 indicates that it has emerged off-table. Scores of 2-4 indicate that it has not emerged yet and should be re-rolled in the beginning of your following turn.

Tunnelers emerging on the table surface at a randomly determined point (divide the x and y axis of the table and roll randomly along each). The tunneler will be travelling in a randomly determined direction and will plough through D6" of ground before coming to a dead halt. Work out damage from collisions immediately. Surviving tunnelers will burst open immediately and the crew can disembark to any position within half their normal move from the tunneler. Tunnelers emerging off-table are assumed to survive intact and the crew will enter at a random point on a random table edge on the following turn.

Termite:

So it's a completely random and potentially risky means to enter the battlefield and I love it.

This month in points:

What's next? I don't have a lot of time to paint before the wrap-up post deadline but might be able to finish some models that are nearly done. It would be great to add some tanks and possibly the terrain piece I built last month, but I'm not taking any stress about it as I'm very happy with this project already.

Until next month!

Jaakko and Forin - Wild card month

A power-board is fundamentally a toy. It is used in the dangerous, but highly popular, sport of sky surfing, in which athletes fly across the skies balanced on flying boards, controlling their flight with body weight and pressure foot throttle. The boards also have a military use, although only amongst unbalanced, maladjusted and battle-crazed troops.

Warhammer 40.000 Rogue Trader

Hello again! I planned to paint a small allied force of Imperial Guard just to justify the addition of a hover tank as my wild card choice but after painting grey uniforms for a few days I changed my mind. Luckily I had some options planned for contingency and which, in hindsight, actually fit the project a lot better.

Let's move into what I managed to paint:

I took it quite easy and wasted some time but managed to finish a squad of five Squats on powerboards who will be used as an alternative Warlord and Hearthguards choice, one Imperial Robot and two Bombots. I also built a terrain feature that I hope to include into the next month.

TROOPS:

Five Squats on powerboards. These models are sculpted by Drew Williams and are available from his Satyr Art Studio. The random equipment tables that Squat heroes use actually have powerboards in them but I'm not randomizing these guys, except probably for the grenades.

 

I actually intended to recreate the powerboard from the Squat with powerboard illustration in the Rogue Trader book. After some research I found out that the board in the picture is made in the likeness of a Santa Cruz Slasher skate board deck. I now have a simplified black and white digital version of the original Santa Cruz art and some printable transfer paper but sadly my printer couldn't handle it and I settled with simple geometric patterns.

 

 

Another Imperial Robot, now with the previously mentioned kill banner. I will make the banner more curly after these photos. I'm still looking for two more robots but will probably have to add them after this challenge is over. 

 

Two Bombots. I was about to convert a few from Daleks before I noticed that Curis from Ninjabread had 3D printed some. The initial plan was to have ten resin prints but as they failed to materialise a friend of mine came to rescue with his PLA printer. They are naturally a bit crude in comparison to resin ones but good enough for the battlefield.

This month in points:

 

 

 

That's it for now. Good luck to the final month!

Jaakko and Forin - Rank & File month #4

Squat armourers are adept at forging rather striking exo-armour, usually embellished with the visage of a Squat Ancestor Spirit. These finely wrought suits of exo-armour become the prestigious war panoply of great Lords and their Hearthguards.

Warhammer 40.000 Compendium

With the completion of the final Rank & File month I can really feel how the pressure is off. I had a lot of time to paint and model and even though I didn't finish my main goal of this month I have several things to show you. I spent a lot of time painting tanks but the rhinos and landraider are still in a WIP-stage. They will hopefully be included in the coming months. Anyway, lets check out the stuff I did finish:

I finished a Combat Squad, a Guildmaster with an Imperial Robot and a Guildmaster in exo-armour on bike. I'm spoiled with Guildmaster options so another Guild Bike Squad would be nice to unlock the option of playing with an Engineers Guild Expeditionary Force. Instead of the promised buildings, the main terrain project for this month was radioactive waste containers and some barrels. I also painted the remains of an Eldar Dreadnought and a statue.

 

TROOPS:

A Combat Squad with heavy bolter. I try to paint two more to expand the army to two Brotherhoods.

Guildmaster with an Imperial Robot of Crusader Class. The chance to buy two of these emerged and I had to add them to this project. The other one is almost finished. A Robot Maniple consists of four robots so I still need to find two more of them.

I took the maximum amount of rolls for gear for the Guildmaster and also did the rolling. He ended up with a sawn off shotgun, a hand flamer, knock out grenades, virus grenades, a bionic arm, a refractor field, a bio scanner and an energy scanner. The sawn off shotgun was a nice coincidence as I can use the biker from last month as the same personality. This one just has it hidden under his trench coat. The plastic arms don't fit this sculpt very nicely.

A Guildmaster in exo-armour with a bike. I have been acquiring exo-armoured Squats to add another Warlord and his Hearthguard to the leader month and happened to get this one in my hands in the process.

This month in points:

 

TERRAIN:

The radioactive waste containing units were made from soda can bottoms with some bitz. I made a mix of green paint and water effect resin to fill the central part and added some clear water effect as another layer. Naturally radioactive waste is stored in an open receptacle.

 

The remains of an Eldar Dreadnought. I have some Eldar Jetbike parts too and try to find the time to use them in a similar fashion.

A broken statue of an exo-armoured Squat Ancestor. The Squat is acrylic resin and the pedestal is a 3d-print.

That's it, until next month!

Jaakko and Forin - Rank & File month #3

On one side of me stand my Homeworld, Stronghold and Brotherhood; On the other my ancestors. I cannot behave otherwise than honourably.

Warlord Kettri son of Egil, Grindel Stronghold

 

 

I know what people think of February but for me March has been the hardest month so far. I had trouble staying focused and painting felt like a chore at times. I think it was mostly because I had allocated a squad of bikers for this month and there was a lot more work in them than I anticipated. I struggled last March too and hopefully it is just a case of passing mid challenge blues. Anyway, I think I'll make some adjustments to the remaining months to make sure I have something inspiring to paint every month.

 

Despite the hardships, I'm very happy with what I managed to paint. I'm also glad that I didn't have to tap into the buffer I painted in February and prospects for April look bright.

I finished one Combat Squad with a lot of heavy weapons, a Living Ancestor and a Guild Bike Squad. In addition to these I kept the terrain pledge alive by putting my imaginary Squat Sappers into work with field fortifications and by modelling and painting an objective marker in the form of a wounded Squat in exoarmour.

 

TROOPS:

A Combat Squad with heavy plasma gun and six! heavy bolters led by another Sqt Bylcow. Yes, Squats love heavy bolters and you can give one to every trooper.

A fragile looking Living Ancestor. There were many other sidearm options but I went with the dreaded laspistol. He is a real hindrance with his movement value of 2 so I will try to include another one in a sidecar later.

A Guild Bike Squad with a leader and seven troopers. I got some more bikes to make this happen, but I ran out of parts and had to improvise as the leader's bike was missing a headlight and rear wheel. I made a blue stuff mold and casted a headlight from acrylic resin. The rear wheel was made from green stuff. I'm pretty happy with both of them. The mark II bike someone might have noticed in the intro post is put aside for a possible hearthguard biker and is also still missing parts.

 

 

I love these bikers now even though they were a pain to paint. I painted these with headlight covers but unfortunately could not source the mentioned fluorescent paints in time. I'll try Tom's recipe and will give them a full fluorescent treatment at a later stage.

 

A close-up of the leader. The Squat lovers among you have probably noticed that it's actually a Guildmaster model. If I have the time and resources I might replace it with another leader and use this as one. The banner is a slight variation from one featured in WD 111 and Warhammer 40.000 Compendium and I used an enlarged version of the original to make the scetch I painted over.

 

This month in points: 

 

I use the OWAC adjusted model count so a biker equals two models.

 

TERRAIN:

For terrain I made a wounded Squat to function as an objective marker and some field fortifications.

 

The intact arm of this poor Squat is a surplus metal part, the body I modelled from resin and green stuff and the wounded side has tubings made from green stuff. The body is broken, not complete and only has the front part to make sure it cannot be mistaken as an actual exoarmour body.

 

The poorly hidden message here is that I have acquired some Squats in exoarmour and will hopefully be able to include an alternative Warlord and Hearthguard into the leader month.

The barbed-wire entanglements are made from toothpicks and a barbed-wire basing product and the dragon's teeth only needed to be glued to their bases, based and painted.

The next, and possibly last, terrain project will be scratch built buildings.

 

Thank you for reading this far, until next month!