Been a little quiet on the blog of late, been head down furiously batch painting Iron Warriors for the NOVA Open Charitable Foundation auctions coming up, but the interstitial pictures just weren't all that interesting. After cranking out 30 Dark Angel tac marines, I'll admit feeling a little trepidation over diving right back in and painting 30 more marines - but it's for a great cause and they ended up being more fun than I expected!


The recipes were provided by the team lead, and I was pretty stoked to see how they turned out. The metals on the armour have a lot of depth, and all the hazard stripes definitely make for a striking look!


I'll admit that a bunch of tac marines aren't the most thrilling aspect of a Heresy army, but they are the backbone of any self-respecting force, and I was happy to take care of the more mundane Troops choices and let the other very talented folks work on the the cool stuff!


The veterans were definitely my favorites to work on as they had a bit more character than their tac squad counterparts. They all got a bit more bling and equipment, and the sergeant got a red-and-white helmet crest to help distinguish them on the tabletop.

All in all they were a hoot to work on, but I don't know that it was enough to kindle a desire to do a full Iron Warriors force of my own (for which my wallet is grateful). Expect to see some pics of the full army and links to the raffle as they go live!

I was honored to be asked to participate in one of the NOVA Open charity army projects again this year, and as is my wont I took on some of the more 'boring' units and let the more talented folks do the cool stuff. That means that I'll be putting the 30 Dark Angel tac marines aside for a bit to work on er, 30 Iron Warriors tac marines. Oof. ...Well, technically 20 tac marines and 10 veterans, so that's way easier, right?


As part of the project, I was sent the raw materials to make the models - Included in the box o' joy were a mess of Mk.IV marines, some Secret Weapon urban bases (interestingly the same ones I used on my Sons of Horus recently) and a bunch of Mk.III shoulder pads. I rummaged through my bits boxes to come up with the appropriate matching Mk.III left-hand shoulder pads which gives the models a bit of a heavier look which befits the Iron Warriors. The sergeants get the usual power fist/bolt pistol combo and I made a couple little tweaks to make them a bit more dynamic.


The brief for the Veterans was to have a couple guys with power swords, including the sergeant, and while it plan was to have it be an 8-man squad without any special or heavy weapons, there were enough bits and bases that I went ahead and banged out a couple meltagunners to round the squad up to 10.


The plan is also for the vets to use the Marksmen special upgrade, and in an effort to help distinguish them from the vanilla tac marines I dug up sufficient scopes for the bolters which I think turned out pretty well! Working out the paint scheme with the project lead, and if all goes according to plan I'll get stuck in on these in the next week or so!

I recently finished off the last of the models I had assembled and figured a family photo of what's been painted up so far was in order. Packed everything up and popped over to the local GW to put them in the Armies on Parade lineup and snapped a few pics!


There's actually quite a few of 'em once I got 'em all laid out! Fairly infantry heavy so far, but I find it's good to crank out a mess of infantry and leave the big toys for later. Still plan on adding more to the force, and there's quite a bit still awaiting assembly, but we're looking at about 3500 points complete already!


Couple off-angle shots as well - Pretty happy with how the greens turned out across the force, and I'm rather enjoying the various spot colors here and there, the hot oranges pop nicely against the cooler tones of the armor.


Updated the painting chart and really pleased with how it's coming along! Still a few things on the ol' wish list to order up from Forge World once the new rulebook drops, and a couple models still awaiting assembly in the Closet of Doom. However, I'm thinking I might switch gears for a bit and work on a different project for a little while to recharge the batteries after all this green!

Squeaked in just under the wire over the weekend, and managed to beat the weather rolling in this morning. In typical Colorado fashion, it was 75F degrees yesterday, and today it's 32F and snowing. Knowing it was bearing down on us I was head down all morning and finished up the various models to the point where I could seal 'em!


The first of the 'main characters' for the force, Maloghurst the Twisted bears a legion banner - while it's a cool sculpt all gathered into his fist, it does make it pretty challenging to add details to. Managed to trim up a Sons of Horus transfer and manage to get it to lay into all the various folds of the cloth.


The Master of Signals is a nice utility character. Able to call down an orbital strike, as well as granting various buffs to squads that he joins, he's useful in a number of situations. He's sort of ideally paired with a heavy support squad, so I suppose I ought to make one!


Next up are the two Veteran squads, and I'm pretty pleased with both of 'em! In looking at the pictures I needs to swap a couple troopers between the two to spread out the 'chest eye' models and balance out the unit members.


Overall I'm really happy with how they turned out, and as you may be able to see I experimented with some water effects on the bases to represent them slogging through a muddy battleground. The bases from Secret Weapon lend themselves well to it, with most of them having some undercut sections that can be filled up to the lip of the base with water. Good stuff!

Bouncing back and forth between projects this month is helping keep things fresh and the painting servitor has been operating at peak efficiency! Got a fair bit of brush time in over the last couple evenings and made some headway on the veterans, Maloghurst and the master of signal.


Started off by giving the models an undercoat of 50/50 Black and USMC Tank Crew, to give the models a nice base for the green to highlight up from.


Next up was a generous drybrush of straight USMC Tank Crew, concentrating a bit heavier on the upper surfaces. Maybe it's the year or so of painting nothing but reds but I gotta say, I really like this green!


Time for the edge highlights! After the stylistic experiment of the recent Thousand Sons, I wanted to get back to my preferred style, and all the armor plates were picked out in USMC Tank Crew Highlight, again concentrating primarily on those edges and surfaces that were exposed to an overhead light source. Also roughed in the reds on the topknots and banner.


The reds were given a wash and highlight pass, and then I went back and re-blacked all the weapons and shoulder pads which cleans up the models dramatically. The black was then given the initial highlight pass with a 50/50 mix of black and Sombre Grey. Starting to come together now!


The second box o' joy arrived yesterday containing, among other things, some legion upgrade kits (shoulder pads, helmets, etc.) and I set to SoH-ing some event only models I've had kicking around for ages. First up is a Primaris Medicae, in a Cataphractii variant suit of armor. He'll be joining the squad of lightning claw terminators planned for the force.


Next is a traitor terminator librarian. I didn't end up using him in the Thousand Sons army for obvious reasons, but he's gonna fit in fine with the Sons of Horus!


Last but certainly not least is of course Ezekyle Abaddon, the not-quite-the-despoiler yet. He'll be leading the big ol' squad of Justaerin Terminators, and will be transported to the fray either via teleportation or in the belly of a Spartan Assault Carrier. There's a model that I'm not particularly looking forward to assembling!


While I'm definitely going traitor with the force, I have always wanted to build and paint the Abaddon vs. Loken duel vignette, so there will be one loyalist when all is said and done!

So I'm planning on bouncing back and forth between the Dreadtober painting and continuing on with the Sons of Horus, as I'm just so jazzed to be working on 'em! Over the weekend I couldn't help but do a little building and put together a couple infantry squads to balance out the recent vehicles.


One of the characters for the Sons of Horus is Maloghurst the Twisted, (deep breath) Cadre-captain of the Sons of Horus, Bearer of the Eye, The Shadowed Hand, and Equerry of the Warmaster. An interesting character, he's both a Praetor-class character allowing the use of Rites of War and also a standard bearer, carrying the Legion Standard - making any astartes units within 6" Fearless. He also makes Veteran squads and Reaver Attack squads Troops choices. On the other hand, any unit he joins cannot Run or make Sweeping Advance moves, and only wears power armour rather than the usual Artificer plate. He does get a Refractor Field though which helps! The model is a mix of parts, based mostly on the Narik Dreygur model, as the face closes matches the one in the book, and the somewhat awkward pose makes him look a bit ungainly as he's described as well.


While I was about it I dug out a Master of Signals model, which is a prerequisite for using The Black Reaving rite of war - not one that I expect to use that often but it's nice to have options! Pretty straightforward build with the addition of a SoH shoulder pad, and a radar dish swap for a little extra visual interest.


There are several options presenting themselves making Veteran squads Troops choices, so I figured I may aw well go that route to begin with, and put together a pair of 'em. Used the leftover bits from making Maloghurst to bash together the two veteran sergeants, and mostly because I love the look went with a pair of the under-slung missile launchers as the squad's specialist weaponry. Definitely a callback to the old, old chaos renegade models.


In order to give 'em a little extra brutalist flair some of the models were modeled wielding their chainswords and one-handing their bolters, opening up the poses to see the rather cool SoH torsos. I'm scheming on building out a few extra standard troopers and a couple Nuncio-vox operators to allow the units to run as basic tactical squads (dropping the missile launchers), and the leftover missile launcher from the set will also be built as a sergeant variant to allow them to be run as a Heavy Support squad.

The weather turned nice enough earlier in the week that I was able to get a mess of models spray sealed, which means I finally have models suitable to hit the table for some test games!


The bedrock of every iteration of my Thousand Sons is Tactical Squad Hesyre, it's hard to go wrong with the good ol' legion tactical squad of 20 marines with extra close combat weapons. Given they will be transported in a Storm Eagle this go-around, they're essentially an assault squad this time!


Veteran Squad Khalmekt is a returning unit, they performed admirably in the previous incarnation of the force so are armed identically with a pair of melta guns. The addition of them getting Brotherhood of Sorcerers with the new rules makes them all the more delicious!


Where one veteran squad was good, a second one is twice as good right? Introducing Veteran Squad Apophis. Nothing too unusual here, more anti-tank goodness to be delivered by drop pod as part of the Khamasiin configuration alongside their other veteran brethren.


Another new addition to the force is Heavy Support Squad Khalid, armed with plasma cannons - The new Thousand Sons rules grant them the option to upgrade them to Aether-fire cannons which grants them Soul Blaze. Foom! Finished these off today, but the weather has subsequently turned so they're still awaiting sealant.


Updated the painting chart, felt good to start turning some boxes green! Started painting the Storm Eagle, as well as the sky chariots, but felt I deserved a little reward for all the painting and started building the assault squads. Nothing worth taking pics of yet, but soon...

Chipping away at the veteran squads, laid in the boltgun metal, the various blues and the first earth-tone base coat for all the bits that will end up being bone and leather. Getting the initial base coat on the bases really helps the models pop!


Trying to keep a little distinction between the blue tones, with the cloaks and stoles being more of a turquoise blue (as a nod to where their color scheme is heading in the near future) while the power cables and weapons being my signature blue. I'm attempting to envision how they'll look with jade scarabs as a secondary spot color, or whether they ought to just be done in the white to match the opposing shoulder. Thoughts?


Interestingly, I think they have a bit more visual interest from the rear at the moment, which suits me okay as that's the side I'll most often be looking at. Hah! Nearing the finish line in any case, hoping to polish them off by the end of the upcoming weekend...

Quick hit this evening - Not a huge amount of hobby time this weekend, only able to get one color done on the Veterans but the every step counts in the long run!


Amazing how adding in the white really helps sell the Thousand Sons vibe. Didn't take nearly as long as laying in all the gold trim, but still had to be very careful about the application so as not to splash over onto the red so it's still a pretty exacting process. So far, so good!

Busy week out in Real Life(tm), but I did get a package in the mail containing a blast from the past!


Back in the Tempus Fugitives era when I first got into the Heresy, my first iteration of the Thousand Sons force included my favorite of the superheavy tanks - The Falchion Eye of Magnus. Custom built by the inestimable Tom McBride (of Blood and Skulls) and somewhat hamfistedly painted by me, it was one of my biggest source of sellers remorse that I'd let it go. Turns out the guy that it was sold to was planning on selling off his force, so I jumped at the chance to buy it back! It's a little the worse for wear (it was built and sold back in 2012) so I had to do a bit of repair work, and plan on updating the paint scheme a little to match up with the current forces. ...Which means among other things I've got about 8,000 rivets to paint. Oof!


On the other side of the coin ,over the last several evenings I have squeezed in a few abbreviated painting sessions and finally this evening got the gold trim laid in on all of the veterans. This was a long, tedious process but now that it's done the rest of the scheme should zoom right along!

With all the awesome news and pics of all the Thousand Sons goodness coming out of the Heresy Weekender, it is time to re-evaluate the army. As with most projects there's usually some little thing that's nagged at me about them - In the case of the recent incarnation of the army, it's that the bases don't match up with the ones I've used on the Prospero Spireguard. However, I recently found a caster who does some rather awesome bases that match up nicely with the Spireguard and I picked up a whole mess of 'em. Of course that means the logical thing to do is throw out all the effort on the last take on the Sons and start again, right?


The next incarnation of my Thousand Sons will be a late-heresy force. I'm envisioning an army set post-Prospero but prior to the Rubric of Ahriman, where the legion is beginning to unravel both figuratively and literally - a bit more flamboyance in the bling, a bit more in the way of mutations showing up, and the influences of the Primordial Annihilator beginning to make their mark as they've done with the other three chaos god-aligned legions in the later stages of the heresy. Leading the charge on the new force is the first of two Veteran Squads (as I'm quite liking what I'm hearing on how they'll function in the upcoming book), using a mix of the new plastic Rubric Marines, backpacks from the Betrayal at Calth set, and Achean shoulder pads from FW.


The sorcerers for the force I sort of envisioned in increasing levels of craziness. This mostly-reasonable chap will be the L1 variant. A little blinged out and with some subtle Tzeentchian iconography but otherwise fairly 'normal'.


I quite like the Corvidae/Divination cult, so the second-level sorcerer really pushes the bird theme, as though the cult ethos is starting to make itself apparent on the form of the armour. Both of the cloaked backpacks are just held on with blu-tac and the moment and will be painted separately.


Lastly I wanted an interesting centerpiece Praetor for the force. The as-yet-unnamed leader of the army lost his legs in the Burning of Prospero, but rather than submitting to bionics he uses his considerable telekinetic powers to hold himself aloft. This model was a blast to build, and is based on the lower half of the new Changeling model, I knew as soon as I saw it that I had to build a sorcerer using the bits!

Next up on the building mat are the second squad of Veterans, and then the first of two twenty-man tactical squads. They'll be a bit more reserved overall, using the Mk.IV Calth bodies, and the FW Achean upgrade shoulders and heads, but I'll need to make another FW order to get all the relevant bits for the second twenty dudes. Of course with all the amazing new kits they've shown off over the last couple days at the Weekender I have a feeling I'll be making several orders for new kits over the next few months!

Made a big push over the last few days to get the Imperial Fists army for Adepticon complete, and took them down to the local GW shop for some army shots on their tables!


Very much a points-dense force mostly built for compact air travel than any on-the-table tactical reason. Very pleased with how they look all lined up, though - I was worried about the colors but I think it strikes a nice balance between the black and the yellow, as befits their veteran status.


For characters and theme the army is based around Sigismund and the various veterans of the 1st company. The big S will be joining the unit of Templar Brethren, and a vanilla Consul leads the Tartaros terminator contingent (very much there to make up the points).


The biggest point sink in the force but one that I just had to include, the Templar Brethren and their transport clock in at 605 points. Are they worth that many points when the resin hits the table? Probably not, but I really dig how they look and the Rule of Cool wins out for me every time!


Carrying on with the veteran theme, it's hard to go wrong with a mess of terminators! The ten-man Tartaros squad is a character-killer unit, intended to deep strike in, plasma the heck out of everything nearby, then pile in the following turn to mop up. At least that's the plan! The Cataphractii are intended to be an honor guard for the Contemptor and provide him backfield support. The Contemptor is there for light anti-air and horde coverage, plus it just looks darn cool!


Finally are the two units of Veterans. They each have a pair of Heavy Bolters, and between them they'll be throwing ~40 shots a turn that hit on 2's, and Rend on 6's which is pretty darn nasty! Dakka dakka dakka!


Couple side shots of the tanks, really happy with the big fists on the Rhino top hatches, though let's just say I'm glad I had four to work with, totally made a hash out of the first one I'd tried! The tanks and dread got a little light weathering here and there, didn't want to go overboard as I envision the Fists strive to keep their equipment looking nice but a little scuff here and there gives 'em some personality.


Definitely felt good to get the whole painting chart flipped over to green! Now with this force out of the way and packed up for the event next month it's time to turn my attention to other projects. The news coming out of the Heresy Weekender has me chomping at the bit to get back to my beloved Thousand Sons, and there's a fairly major shake up in my plan with them.

...Let's just say it includes the statement "My current Thousand Sons army is going on the auction block and I'm starting anew. Again." Hah!