It's amazing what working under a deadline will do for my productivity! I had a blissfully event-free Friday evening and the whole day Saturday, and buckled in for a marathon painting session to finish off the army before next weekend's event. Barring any minor issues that may reveal themselves in the photography stage the force is ready to rock!


First of course is a quick look at the force on the board as I mess around with various unit layouts. I really need to invest in a monopod - this was as in focus as I could manage. Hope to get some better final pics from the actual event next weekend!


So let's go through what all got finished over the two-day marathon - First up is the Watch Master, which is a superb sculpt, and I rather like the peek into the upcoming Custodes rules with his Guardian Spear!


I was quite taken by the Blood Angel librarian in terminator plate that was shown in the book and knew I wanted to take a crack at it. Continued on with the ghostly green for the force weapon, definitely going to be using that recipe for future psykic gear and spell effects...


I'd taken a group photo of Kill Team Cassius a little while back, so it was only fair that Watch Force Artemis got the same treatment. The two 5-man veteran squads have been shown before, so it was really just two models that needed to be completed for this unit to make it to the finish line.


The man himself, Brother Artemis is my favorite sculpt of the DW range, having owned the Inquisitor 54mm scale version back in the day. I might just have to trawl eBay and see if I can find another one, as I'd sold it on yoinks ago.


Sliding into place for my Dreadtober vow is Brother Nihilus. His background is rather interesting in the Death Masque booklet, he's essentially an interred Blackshield, so it's anyone's guess as to what lurks in his murky past! That said, after doing nothing but Contemptors for so long, working on an old 'brick dread' was kind of fun.


Not a whole lot changed on the Corvus front other than a little more weathering and some edge highlighting of the red wing stripes (though they are blown out in the pictures somewhat). Really dig this model, but it would be 100% cooler if it was 20% larger. There's just a bit of dissonance to me between its stats and its appearance. Still, best flyer GW was released in plastic for quite some time!


Finally, the bodyguard unit for the Watch Master and terminator librarian, Squad Graul - While I appreciate the hyper-individualistic nature of Kill Team Cassius, I wanted these folks to have a very singular battlefield role - close combat and protection of the HQ units. At least that's the theory, we'll see how they perform once I get them on the tabletop!

Next up, back to the whole reason I picked up Overkill in the first place and ended up with this whole Deathwatch army - a swarming brood of Genestealer Cult gribblies!

Frantically pressing onwards with the Deathwatch as the Armies on Parade deadline looms ever closer! Got a bit more work done on Brother Nihilus (doing triple duty for Dreadtober, Zombtober and the AoP project), started laying in the color blocks and some of the gold trim in preparation for further detailing:


So far, so good! Plenty of further highlighting and colorization to go of course, I think the usual blue power cables and plasma coils should really help him pop once they get laid in!


I will admit that I was having more fun painting the Corvus and ended up lavishing a bit more attention on it than poor Nihilus over the last couple days. Got the reds highlighted up, the canopy painted in and laid in a little weathering here and there to help break things up a bit. I'm thinking I might do a bit of extreme edge highlighting in a hot orange on the red just to give it a bit more oomph. Wasn't necessary on the infantry, but on the larges areas on the vehicles it may look good.


A bit more detailing on the front and undersides to go, but I really dig the profile of the model - the bog ol' inquisition symbols on the top and front are great! I do wish they'd designed the model such that the front doors were openable (they're just facade pieces that glue on to the blank plastic walls of the front of the model), but since 99.9% of the time I end up (usually accidentally) gluing the assault ramps on my land raiders shut I suppose it's not a huge deal. Hah!

Nearing the finish line! Got the basic black/line highlighting done on the remaining 6 infantry for the force over lunch yesterday, should be all done with the force by the end of the weekend!

Another quick hit today, back when I started the Land Raider I'd also done the linework on the Corvus, and while I was working on the Dreadnought over the last couple days I'd also taken the time to lay in the initial colors on the flyer as well.


My favorite part of the model is the big ol' inquisition symbol on the roof, rather happy I went with the underslung hurricane bolters so as not to cover it up. Still a ways to go of course, but I quite like how it's coming along thus far!

While I did have a little hobby time after work over the last couple days, I wasn't feeling the call of the paintbrush and thought I'd have a little fun putting together the Corvus Blackstar that I'd picked up a little while ago. I really liked the look of it compared to the recent questionable design decisions I thought the GW design team have made with most of their other marine flyers (the Nephilim is pretty sweet but the rest just don't resonate with me). This new addition however, oh my yes!


I will eventually do a second Corvus with lascannons, but for this one I wanted to go with a ground-attack pattern look - Airbrakes deployed and hammering away with the assault cannons! The kit went together like a dream, but once I had it all together I was a honestly little surprised by the size of the airframe. I was expecting something Valkyrie-sized and it's significantly smaller (Sergeant Crull for scale) - Not really a complaint, it still feels pretty beefy and it'll be easier to paint and store comparatively speaking!


I wanted to go extra shooty with this one and knew I wanted to add the optional Hurricane Bolters, but I love the big ol' Inquisition symbol on the roof and didn't care for how the weapon pods covered it up. That said, it turns out there's a pair of rivets on the underside that line them up just about perfect for mounting the two weapon pods under the wings, and I think they're a bit more realistically positioned for ground attack like this. I also popped a magnet into the roof so that the various launcher and sensor options could be easily swapped out but also stay put during gameplay.

Overall I really enjoyed building this kit and am rather looking forward to painting it up (assuming I can wade my way through the eight tons of bling on the troops)!



Off to Nova in just a few short days which means time is running out to get in on the rather excellent raffles for some beautiful armies that are up for grabs. The money goes to a good cause, and you need not be present to win - the armies and other models will happily be shipped anywhere in the world! Check 'em out - a couple bucks could win you some truly epic prizes!