Deathwatch 002: Overkill Ultramarines Completed

I got Chaplain Cassius and Vael Donatus finished up and based over the weekend. It was a lot of fun getting these guys painted up and I look forward to getting the next couple done.

I kept a picture of the GW studio model up for each of these characters and stayed pretty true to the design. I did go with a red casing on the Stalker pattern bolter and bolt pistol. Next up will be Drenn Redblade, the teleport homer, and servo skull (I think). After that I plan to work on these in pairs, except for the terminator and biker.

Here is everything I've painted so far this year. Ave Imperator!

Cheers,

CJ

Deathwatch 001: Killteam Reminiscence

I've been a fan of the Deathwatch ever since they were featured in a White Dwarf battle report, allied with the Steel Legion. They looked so cool and  the way the battle report was set up they were just awesome. Back then it wasn't very difficult to find back issues of WD so I tracked down the ones I needed that had the Deathwatch rules and Index Astartes entry. I decided after looking to the rules that I wanted to put together a unit of Deathwatch. I'm excited to see the Resurgence of these guys now, I mean it's about 14-15 years after the fact for me. The Deathwatch was the ordo militant that rumor had firmly ensconced with the lost Codex: Alienhunters. Death Masque game looks to be fun, and the Deathwatch Marines in there look great. The Killteam included with Overkill are also some really characterful miniatures.

Now back then Games Workshop had just two options for Deathwatch conversion. There was a head sprue that included two heads and then there was the a stalker boltgun and shoulder pad sprue. I picked up 10 or 11 of the latter from Mail Order, and then I bought 5 blisters Dark Angels tactical marines, for the robed bodies. I end up getting a Dremel at the same time-my first one-because it made it so much easier to grind off the Dark Angels iconography on those miniatures. I picked up a couple of heavy Bolter Marines since heavy bolters with suspensors are badass (18" frag missile that doesn't scatter? OKAY!).  And I loved to run these guys, they were so much fun back in the day... this was 3rd edition, and it was a few years til 4th still. I had a lightning claw, two power fists, a couple power weapons, and the force sword wielding Librarian. My Deathwatch Killteam was ready to go. 

I even built a dedicated Rhino for them- painted the interior, very carefully replaced the bolter moulded on the bulkhead with one of the stalker pattern, and gave the driver a Deathwatch shoulderpad. When 4th edition came out with it came the new Space Marine commander box. The bits from that box allowed me to update my Deathwatch Killteam and I even got started painting the models. I never got around to getting good pictures of them, mores the pity.

So with that in mind and the Leman Russ project kind of stalled I've moved on to my Deathwatch Overkill Marines, and decided to start with Chaplain Cassius and Vael Donatus. I'll get those guys painted up and then move on. I have no idea what order I'll get the rest painted in.

I gave these guys my usual basecoat of Testors Model Master flat black acrylic, followed by drybrush layers of Codex Grey and Administratum Grey. My plan is to give them a few coats of Nuln Oil and see how it turns out... hopefully what I've got in mind works.

Cheers,

CJ

Happy Yule to Me

Got some presents for myself during the FLGS holiday sale. I figure I'm overdue for the Space Marine codex. And who can complain about a second Knight? Next on that front is some Forge World reinforcements if work is good :D

Happy Holidays everyone!

See you next year!

CJ

Techmarine Command Squad 001

In March I painted up this guy for the painting contest over on /r/warhammer40k.

He counts as a Librarian with that big ass axe of his. I decided when I was organizing models and bits into potential units back when I updated my overall Drax-agram that he needed a command squad. Now that I have a (sort of) regular game to join in, I'm actually getting it put together.

A couple years ago and in anticipation of this project I bought a few sets of bionics from here and there. I ended up with four legs that I couldn't help but try in the above configuration. I seem to recall a Skitarii commander from one Black Library novel or another with four legs and a battle axe. With that in mind I set out to build my company champion.

Early configuration of legs

The torso on the hips made for too squat a profile, so I added a 'spine'

This arm proved impractical for the pose I wanted, and has been replaced

The Company Champion is well on his way now. He will be equipped with a power weapon and combat shield. As intended, he is a bit taller then the other lads.

Apothecary's power pack

The Apothecary will have the standard gear, of course, and I used another of the bits purchased a bit back to add a servo arm and a couple of mechandrites.

My Standard Bearer is an old white metal Techmarine. His bolt pistol has been swapped out for a storm botler and the banner is the mechanicus sigil with a couple bits from the Rhino kit added on. The sigil is from a CoD panel originally.

Here is the  assembled command squad. Most of them still need power packs and servo arms, but by the time I get to publishing this post I will probably have started on those. Hell, at the rate I post these might even be painted by then.

So here is were overall the army sits. I have the bits to move forward on the Devastators. Once their done I need to decide how I want to represent all those servitors.

Cheers,
CJ

eBay: amidoinitrite?

...I'd like to think so.

Hello everyone out there in internet land. I've recently had some great luck on eBay and I'd love to share with you all.

The above is the contents of the latest auction I picked up. Included were the following:

• 1 sealed Space Marine Tactical Squad (2004 recut)
• 2 Imperial Aquila 40k dice sets in tin
• Crashed Imperial Aquila Lander terrain
• Battlefield Accessories sprue still in bag
• 4 white metal Space Marine Scouts with sniper rifles
• 1 Battle for Maccrage Space Marine Tactical Squad
• 1 Space Marine Devastator with heavy bolter
• Codex: Tau (3rd ed)
• Codex: Tyranids (4th ed)
• Codex: Space Marines (4th ed)
• Battle for Maccrage mini rulebook

Not bad, eh? Even better is the fact that for the aforementioned prizes I paid less for the winning bid than the shipping, and the total was still only 29$. The moral of the story is to watch eBay, ladies and gentlemen. I don't know if the fact that the codices are all outmoded or what, but the contents of the auction were clearly listed, and the photos that were included with the listing showed basically the same that mine does.

This wasn't a last minute snipe, either. I had forgotten about this one, and got an email letting me know that I had in fact won the lot. Want to know the real kicker? I came to this listing in the first place in search of the crashed lander terrain piece a few weeks ago when the terrain bender I've been on set in.

In other news, in the 6MMRPC I've taken steps to begin prototyping of the Suppressor pattern Taurox:

This is my proof of concept, and a practice run at getting all the measurements figured out in 3d. Everything is going well so far. Stay tuned for more progress on the mac n cheese tank ;)

Cheers,

CJ

Army Progress

Its that time again.

Here is my army's current Drax-agram...

...and my Drax-agram from 2012. A little different, eh?

Right off I see there are a whole lot more models on the chart this time around. In 2012 I had something like just under 100 wounds to field. This year sees the total up around 200. In 2012 there was nothing but Imperial Guard on my roster. 2014 sees the forces of the Inquisition and the Adeptus Astartes added to the progress chart. I have a strong core of Space Marines as my 'counts as' Mechanicus force, and the Inquisition is modeled in the same vein.

Where does all this leave me? With a better handle on what needs to be done going forward, overall. Having a visualization of what comes next will also help me stay on task with the projects the army calls for.

Cheers,

CJ

Adeptus Mechanicus Devastators

So I happened upon these models on eBay and at a glance they seemed uniquely suited to my purposes. I snatched them up and what a deal, I must say. All of the Space Marines have the driver chest piece with the cog sigil, as well as the Mechanicus shoulder pads. When the models arrived, I was pleasantly surprised to see that all the bolter marines had SM Scout Biker combi-bolters. The close combat marines had a variety of bits, including two of the old Blood Angels Honour Guard tech-axes, two each of Space Wolves power axes and swords.

Now unfortunately, these guys were assembled poorly and pained sloppily. Worse, even though they all sport the cog shoulder pad it is on the wrong side of the model. I carefully snapped all the arms off of the figures. They had quite a few layers of paint that a brake fluid bath took care of nicely. Once they came out, there were blobs of superglue revealed everywhere.

I did my best to scrape it out where I could.

Meanwhile, having this lot of marines arrive meant that the time had arrived to get some more heavy weapons, in the form of a SM Devastator box. I really can't say too much more to sell it than eight heavy weapon options. I've started out with the heavy bolters, since my first ever 40k figure was one of the 3rd edition versions of the same.

The challenge that the heavy weapons present is that they all have shoulder pads moulded as part of the sculpt. They also happen to be in the same wrong place for my amry... time to break out the razor saw.

It took a bit of doing, but I managed to get the pads replaced on the heavy bolters. The first taught me quite a bit about how to screw it up, but some greenstuff will fix that. The second went much smoother. Seen here as well are the bits for a missile launcher Devastator. I have a second set prepped somewhere. These were much more straight forward to convert once the moulded in shoulder pad was removed, just insert cog pad and viola. The rest all sit against the weapon or the power cables. I say its all worth the work in the long run.

Cheers,
Xi

Tech Marine Sergeant

I present the first figure of my Allies Contingent, Brother Magos Rickard.  The base of the figure is the Tech Marine that came with the 3rd ed Command Squad box.  I removed the arm that held the signature cog toothed axe, and added the chainblade arm from the Puppetswar.eu Mechanical Implants and Weapons pack.  The cog axe was saved for another project, of course.  Here is a picture of this guy while getting painted.  I must beg forgiveness in advance, right now the only available camera is a cell phone camera.

The model got a base coat of Mechrite Red, followed by a coat of Devlin Mud wash.  Once dry, a heavy drybrush of Blood Red was applied, followed by a coat of Baal Red wash.  I should mention that I cut all my washes with a few drops of Future floor wax, which you can learn all about here.  It really is amazing.

The reverse side.  The next step was to pick out all the metallic detail that I wanted with Chainmail, and then that washed with black ink, and drybrushed with Mithril Silver.  The select bits of gold on the figure were first painted with Scorched Brown, then Burnished Gold with a wash of Delvan Mud.  The highlight was applied with Shining Gold.  The exposed cabled were then pained with Kommando Khaki, and washed with Delvan Mud.  The skin of the face was last.  While I got close to what I wanted, its not quite there.  I based the area with Kommando Khaki, then washed it with Baal Red.  I then drybrushed the area with a 1:1 Kommando Khaki to Rotting Flesh.  Finally, the eye and mouth were given a dash of Delvan Mud.  That wash seems to have been the star here...

Here is the completed figure.  Brother Magos Rickard, armed with a bolt pistol and a chainsword.  Soon to be added is his Servo Arm.  He will lead a Tactical Squad.  I will be adding some different Heavy Support options to this group, mostly since the conversion possibilities are so broad.  I have some plans for heavy combat servitors that count as Terminators.

Cheers,
-Xi