Universal Carriers Complete

 This past Friday was a down day for me, so I finished up the pair of Universal Carriers.  I have not added any numbering or significant iconography as it didn't seem like something there was much on the reference images.  In addition, my Matilda also does not have much iconography.  This completes out 2/3 of my initial 1,000 points of British 8th army.  A 10-man infantry section, 1 Lt and Attendant, and 6 Pdr gun are left to paint - but after a break to work on some other things.

The FLGS community's excitement has also shifted from Bolt Action and Warlord games in general back to Age of Sigmar as well as Warhammer 40k Kill Team.  Add to this people getting into Wyrd Games range, Maulifaux and The Otherside!  Lastly, there is the other World War II games - Blood Red Skies and Cruel Seas, which hold much more interest for me than the Wyrd Games.  We will see what the new year holds.

Up next for me is the Warlord Titan for Adeptus Titanicus and a small Kill Team of Orks.

Universal Carriers In-Work

Some slow progress this past week on my pair of Universal Carriers.  Both are equipped with anti-tank rifles.  They will transport the two sections I finished last week.  Again, schemes inspired by the images on tank-encyclopedia.

Pair of Universal Carriers

Expanding 8th

Royal Engineers and 5-man section

I was more disciplined this past week with painting.  I got the 5-man Royal Engineers (viewer's left) and the 5-man Infantry section painted.  These are intended to ride in a pair of Bren Carriers; the next thing I plan to paint.  I intend to paint the carriers based on the images on Tanks-Encyclopedia's page on the Universal Carriers.

The Strumpet complete

The Boring Strumpet

I finished up the Boring Strumpet Gunhauler last week.  This completes painting up my new 1,000 pt of Barak-Mhornar.  In addition, it completes 1,500 pts of painted Kharadron Overlords, but not what I want to field for 1,500 pts.  I will probably pickup the starter box for a third Gunhauler, Thunders, and Endrinriggers.

Over the holiday weekend, I played two games at 1k pts.  The first was against a new Stormcast list, which was just difficult.  Even against what seems like half the army, I felt unable to effectively defeat units.  A 12" range for most of my weapons makes engaging a threat effectively also a setup for being charged.  Lastly, the hardness of Stormcast makes it hard to knock them down and keep them down.

The second game was against a Goblin Spider list.  I did much better, which I attribute to us both rolling really poorly.  My opponent put about a third of his army out of position, while also not committing his general and sorcerer/monster-spider to the primary fight.  This let me fight a third of his army with ~two thirds of mine.  Once I won that fight, I was able to collect my forces on my objective and finish off the out-of-position third.  Both of us rolled poorly all game, but I think my victory came down to poor positioning on my opponents part.

Balloon Distraction

For the past few weeks, I have been working off-and-on upon my second Kharadron Overlords Gunhauler, the Boring Strumpet.

In-Work Boring Strumpet

I recently changed up my 1,000 point list to field two Gunhaulers instead of the Gunhauler and Frigate.  The Boring Strumpet has a a Drill Cannon instead of a Sky Cannon, giving it 6" more range for a bit less damage.  This also freed up points to bring in the Skywardens, giving me even more board presence overall.  Sadly, the two games to compare with were both against Stormcast, which were able to roundly defeat my list using ~50% of the army (bad rolls may have played a part, but still).

As I look ahead to 2,000 points, I am considering leaning into the Gunhaulers more and going with a Grundstok Escort Wing outside of the mandatory core of 3x Arkanaut Companies.  We will see if over the next few months I am motivated enough to paint up another Gunhauler, another 3 Endrinriggers, and a final Company of Arkanauts.  It may be all for naught as the Kharadron Overlords seem to struggle in my local meta and trying to actually use the range of miniatures versus the "optimized" lists.

First Component of Commonwealth Platoon

Easy simple update to share.  I got my first British and Commonwealth 8th Army section completed.  I will be adding probably two more groupings of these guys to complete my Infantry Platoon.  As I have previously shown, there are two Bren Carriers, an Engineering Section, a 5-man Rifleman section, another 10-man section, Mortar and 6-pdr Artillery piece.  I think the Bren Carriers and Engineering Section and 5-man section will make a good next component (after a brief detour to work on the second Kharadon Overlords Gunhauler).

Infantry Section, Matilda Infantry Support Tank, & MMG Team

I have also started the process of writing down map-campaign rules for the group of us.  I have identified a good map and pulled out the old Warhammer General's Compendium to reference as I write things down.   Relooking at the campaign aspect has helped, I think.  I have aspirations of adding an Armor Platoon of M3 'Honeys' possibly supported by the Grant, but that is in the long run.

Basic Colors

Slow Progress on 8th Army 

I got a little more paint on the 8th Army minis.  These are the initial units being painted.  A little daunting.

Just need to spend time on them.  The motivation is not entirely there.  Part of it is a lack of continued excitement among others, possibly my own fault.

Lots of projects to work over the coming months.  It is enjoyable to see the progress, but the quantity is a bit overwhelming somehow.

Slow Progress - Distracted

Sorry, no pictures after two weeks.  I have been lazy/distracted by things other than miniatures the past two weeks.  A lack of excitement on the parts of others and video games has sapped motivation from me.  Hopefully some progress to report next week.

8th: Built and Primed

 

1,000 pt Commonwealth Reinforced Platoon

This past week, I spent my hobby time assembling my British 8th Army Commonwealth Reinforced Platoon.  I primed it all Saturday night.  It is a fairly straightforward force built out of the 8th army Starter Army with the addition of a Matilda Infantry Support Tank.

It has two full Infantry Sections, a 1Lt with an aid, a 5-man Infantry Section with a Universal Carrier, a medium mortar team, a medium machine gun team, a 5-man unit of Royal Engineers with a Universal Carrier, a 25 pdr light artillery piece, and the Matilda.

This should be a decent way to get going in campaign (and Bolt Action in general).  Beyond this, I am looking at an Armored Platoon, like Stuarts.

Busy Week

Not even the whole Warlord

I have been busy this week.  I knew that the British 8th Army sets for the Western Desert Campaign was arriving at the store.  I dove into finishing my current Italian Infantry Section and assembling my Warlord titan for Adeptus Titanicus.  The Warlord was put on pause for magnets, which arrived Sunday - after work began on the 8th Army unit.

My 8th Army will either be British or Australian; I have not yet settled on which exactly.  Any armor I build out will be from a Royal Armour Regiment.  The long term plan is to have two platoons, one Reinforced Infantry Platoon and one Armor Platoon, both hitting 1,000 points, with the potential to expand to 1,500 points.

Konflikt '47: Infantry In Progress

Simple update for this week; weekend was a busy one filled with lots of stuff other than painting or gaming.  I have an infantry squad and my Lieutenant with attendant in work.

Progress shot

Returning to Cygnar

My FLGS is starting up a Warmachine league at the end of the month.  I have most of a Cygnar army purchased and built.  In addition to K47 Co-Belligerent Italians, I will be working on getting my Cygnar painted.  My 0-point army is the caster Captain Jeremiah Kraye, a Minuteman Warjack, Firefly Warjack, and Lancer Warjack.

Light Warjacks painted up

The Lancer Warjack (viewer's right) was painted probably two years ago at this point.  I am going for a less bright blue Cygnar force.  Painting Warmachine definitely provides opportunities to think about small things in each model as for most warbands, you can minimize the repetitiveness of having super similar models.

Konflikt '47: Bersaglieri Complete

I finished up the heavy armored Bersaglieri this weekend.  As I was getting to the layering stage, I realized that I am not looking for these to be as high-quality paint jobs as my Horus Heresy Ultramarines.  This is an project to have an army to fight Weird World War II battle!

Bersaglieri Armoured Infantry

I skipped on details like eyes or other parts to really focus on getting them looking like a unit.  I think they will look good on the table.  I did decide after looking at the models to add the bright grass. I need to figure out what is next in my ECI efforts, I have a list written out, just no models to jump into.

In addition, a group of us are considering playing Bolt Action, North Africa campaign.  I have been given the wife's blessing to play Rommel's Afrika Korps.

Konflikt '47: Co-Belligerent Italy

My FLGS is in the midst of a Konflikt '47 league.  The store owner, my friend encouraged me to get into it, to include trading in other products for Gates of Antares that I had yet to start working on and was not getting played as much.

After talking over the various factions with my immediate family, I was told 1) no Axis and 2) that I should do the southern Italians.  The core theme for them is supposed to be infantry heavy, so I intend to theme them more as a mountains force, supported by some lighter armor.  We will just have to wait and see.

I have been slowly working through the Bersglieri Armored Infantry. One will be a spare as I also picked up the Captain Maximo model.  Since there are no rules for him, he gets to be the bad-ass NCO leading the Bersglieri.  The Bersglieri unit can run as low as 4 models or up to 8, giving me a nice range of options in deploying them.

ECI: Bersaglieri Armored Infantry Squad

TY: Polish Carnations

Slowly working on burning down small projects to round out collections I have.  These Polish Carnations have probably been sitting in their box since before December.  I broke out the airbrush again and painted these up.  Hopefully other people at my FLGS will be getting into Team Yankee more soon.  I am hoping to get a decent size group and setup a series of linked games.  We will see.

Polish Carnations

Up next... ECI Bersaglieri Armored Infantry Squad

Necromunda: Ma T and Grendlsen

Ma T, champion of Buck's Outriders

This past week I started to tackle various projects I have in my hobby queue.  Until today, many of the items I had planned to tackle were rounding out projects mostly done or single miniatures.  But projects finished - Orlock Champion #2, Ma T and the Squat Bounty Hunter, Grendl Grendlsen.

Ma T is a kit-bash of an Escher head and Orlock body.  It is not the cleanest conversion, but it works functionally.  The model was easy to paint the color palette was already clearly set by the other seven models.  She is sporting fancy hair, but is still mostly blonde with a spot of blue.  The blue is a nod to each Project Blue November, when my spouse dying her hair as part of Diabetes awareness.  Ma T is the avatar of my wife in Buck's Outriders.

I picked up Grendl Grendlsen at Warhammer World.  I have a disused fantasy Dwarf army and my Kharadron Overlords.  I could not pass up Grendl as I knew he would be good fun to paint and hopefully field at some point.

Warhammer World: Neat Things!

I am not going to completely share my whole album of Warhammer World pictures here, but some of the dioramas and scenes I liked most.

Battle at the Bridge

Nothing fancy in terms of battle report or anything.  We decided for the 3-way fight, the Adeptus Astrates would attempt to hold the bridge against the two competing xenos of Tyranids and Necrons. I remembered to take photos at the beginning and very end.  We got to play on an awesome table, that I would love to plan for a large game of Horus Heresy.

Most of the Novamarines setup to hold the Bridge

Novamarine Redemptor Dreadnought

The Redemptor Indomitus

Back over the Labor Day weekend (30 May), my brother and I were hanging out discussing the upcoming day we planned to spend at Warhammer World playing a game of Warhammer 40k between my Novamarines and his Tyranids.   I had originally planned to use the Fire Raptor as part of the army, but he encouraged me to pick up the Redemptor instead and crank it out.

It truly marks the last of the Novamarine Primaris models I intend to paint.  At this point I have most the Primaris units, save the Reavers.  In addition, I am not particularly interested in pickup games of 40k at present and neither is a large part of my community.  They have focused on Konflict '47 and possibly Team Yankee.

Primaris Captain

Captain of the Novamarines Fourth Company

I have finished my Primaris Novamarine army.  I kitbashed a Primaris Captain with plasma pistol and power fist.  I finished him about a week ago.  It was a good way to finish out the army.

He wears marks of the XIII Legion and holds a title relating back to the Legion.  The Captain of the Fourth Company of the Novamarines Chapter remains a Suzerain to the Tetrarch of Iax, Ultramar and bears the XIII Legion command marking on the left shoulder pad.  The position now holds new meaning since the Indomitus Crusade is underway.

The remaining piece of the army will be a relic Legion Raptor, which continues to serve the Novamarines Chapter.

Fire Raptor!

Fire Raptor Under Construction

I have decided to shift my approach on the last 500 points for my Novamarines army.  Instead of pursuing an Imperial Knight, I am going to include a Relic Fire Raptor from the Ultramarines Legion 10th Company!

In addition, I am going to drop the Aggressors and Gravis Captain at 2,000 pts and bring back the Hellblasters as well as a converted Primaris Captain with Power Fist.

Front

Side

Primaris Still in Work + Frigate

Another progress update on my hobby activities.

Not quiet done.

I am almost done with the 9 Primaris Novamarines.  I still need to blue highlight the back six and then dust them all with the rust dust on their bases. Barring the addition of a Primaris Captain or losing one of them to the Warhammer store painting competition, I this will finish up my Novamarines project (I think).

Under Construction

I forget whether I have mentioned this previously, but I am pursuing a more competitive ready Age of Sigmar list and thus need to add 2 Frigates, 10 Arkanauts, and 3 Endrinriggers to my collection.  I already had the second Frigate.  My current plan is to pick up a Battleforce box to get everything else, plus a third Gunhauler.

Primaris and some Heresy

In Work Novamarines

A some painting during the past week and a weekend game of Horus Heresy

I have been steadily painting up nine more Primaris Novamarines for my 1,500 pt list.  I made need to add one more, to contribute to a recently opened store's collection of painted Marine models - we will see.

The Novamarine project is nearing its end with this last sprint.  There is the possibility of adding a Primaris Captain (vice the Captain in Gravis Armor), but I do not intend to add a unit of Reavers or a Dreadnaught.  The next 40k proper project is actually likely to be a Knight Paladin.  This will bring my current 40k efforts largely to a close.

I have been musing about a Ultramarines 1st Company around Marnus Calagar - but that is a distant project that will first ride on the backs of something like Cataphactii or Tartoros Terminators for my 30k Ultramarines.

Nearly Complete Gang

On Friday, I finished up 7 of 8 of my Orlock gang.  I have yet to get the Escher body to start from as a base for my second Champion, Ma T.  I played a game of Necromunda on Saturday and enjoyed it.  I am looking forward to the opportunity to convert a model and potentially convert a few more as upgraded versions of my gangers in a campaign.

The men of Buck's Riders

Slow Progress

Did some more layering on the Orlocks.  I lost a bit of steam on painting the past few weeks.  The layers make them much brighter and will hopefully make the safety oriented color theme really pop on them.  I intend to do a second wash over the brighter colors to get more grim on them.

Orlock's In Work

A little work done this weekend on the Orlocks.  I got all the main colors on the minis and washed them.  Layers are next to make the orange and yellow positively pop.

Catch Up before a Week Away

This past weekend I was knocked down by what I can only describe as the flu.  Two weekends was a busy gaming weekend.  I got in a pair of Age of Sigmar games and picked up a Necromunda gang (Orlocks).   This past week, I assembled a pair of Rapier Laser Destroyers for my 13th Legion (30k) and 7/8 gangers for my Orlock gang (Necromunda).  This coming week I am out of town all week and so will but unable to work on minis during the week.

Unprimed Rapier teams

The Rapiers were not too bad to assemble, the resin was worse part being the treads not quite fitting.  They will make a solid addition to my current Ultramarines force, giving them some much need anti-tank punch.  This will let my primary opponent field some tanks without feeling bad.

In-Work Orlocks

This past weekend, while feeling ill I started to paint the base colors on the Orlock gang.  Each Orlock has a name based on a friend or family member's nickname.  I am going for a rail-workers motif, with lots of caution yellow and here-I-am orange.

Praetor Captain

Captain Aedvarus of the 106th

This past week I did some light painting, completing the Horus Heresy era Ultramarines Praetor.  He was straightforward for the most part, with most of the decisions already made.

Veteran of Terra, Praetor of the XIII Legion, Captain of the 106th Company Aedvarus of Merica.

Captain Aedvarus goes onto to lead the defense of Argeia from World Eaters, survives the Heresy, and is the future Second Founding Captain of the 4th Company of the Novamarines Chapter

Repulsor Complete

Repulsor in profile

  I finished up my Repulsor this weekend.  I am not super happy with it, but large flat surfaces are a challenge to paint well with a brush.  I did not feel confident with painting it with an airbrush yet as it has many straight lines.  I probably could have taken more time with the transition highlights and thinned the lines a bit.  I think at the distance of a the table top, it will look good along side the rest of my Novamarine Primaris detachment.

Repuslor In-Work

In-Work Repulsor

This past week, I worked on painting the Repulsor tank.  I think I have completed basing the vehicle and thus have gotten most of the colors onto the hull.  I took the photo before doing a significant amount of washing the whole thing with null-oil.  Unlike the rest of the army thus far, I primed it mostly white.  The large blue strip was primed with using masking over the white.  If I did it again, prime the line first, then tape over it and then prime the rest of the model.  Lesson learned.

Nuport's Mariners

Nuport's Mariners and some objective markers

 This weekend, I finished up painting my second Arkanaut Company.  This completes my 1,500 point army.  I did some minor conversions to the Company Captain to turn him in Kris Nuport.  Captain Nuport has some relics from before the the Kharadon's took took the sky.

This week, I am starting on the Novamarines Repulsor.  Part of this is in the vain hope that GW announces that a unit other than the Arkanaut Company is a Battleline unit before I work on my last 500 points up to 2,000 points.

Captain Nuport, surrounded by his Mariners

Captain Nuport's antecatalysm axe head