Sunday, July 17, 2011

Its been that long...?

Dang...

Didn't realise how long it has been since I last posted...
I feel rather ashamed about this...

Last few months have seen minimal hobby work done, due to purchasing a new computer and getting all that sorted out, as well as a long and tedious work lift that kinda saps out the will to be creative...

Yet, I do have some things to report on the hobby front!
I have made progress production wise, and also made some decisions about how I will be approaching my hobby work for now.
Though I am lacking pictures at this point in time...

1. The half-track has been sidelined atm, as I really should finish the list I have written up before I start adding extras to it...
Thus I have started converting the following:
- HQ squad
- Sly Marbo
- 2 squads for the transports
- 2nd heavy weapons squad
- 2nd transport
Almost finished, just requiring minor details and basing include:
- 2nd squad on foot
- Platoon command squad
- 1st heavy weapons squad
Everything else Bloodpact wise is on the sidelines til those are completed, so i can get the first 1k list done and get them on the table before i branch out to the extra 850pts..

2. The Dark Elves though only mentioned in passing months and months back are slowly taking shape after months of list writing and re-writing.
So far I believe I have about 750 or so points worth assembled, perhaps more, and a paint scheme decided on, and started to paint them up.
So far the following are assembled/started painting:
- Master on foot
- 9 Spearmen retinue
- 15 Corsairs
- 5 Dark Riders
- 5 Shades
- Assassin
Yet to be started include:
- Additional 10 Spearmen
- 15 Corsairs
- Lord on Cold One
- 9 Cold Ones retinue
- 10 Cold Ones
- 5 Shades
- 2 Reaper Bolt Throwers
- Sorceress
Should prove an effective force when used right, and once all painted up will hopefully look stunning on the table top.

3. Tyranids have been sidelined near indefinitely.
I have yet to actually do any work on the actual army since the coming of the current codex, the only things that have been done to the army have been due to entering modeling/painting comps at the local GW and nothing more.
Once I have finished what I have on the table atm, then I will be resurrecting them.

4. Easterlings have joined the Tyranids on the sideline.
Hearts just not there atm, and waiting for some finecast captains to hopefully come out, as after looking at what I have to do to make my current white metal captains look decent... I may as well just use them as paper weights the quality of the miniatures is that poor.

Thats about all I have in the way of updates atm, not much considering the time between last post and now, but I am trying!

Til next time all

Friday, April 15, 2011

Bloodpact N20 Half-track -Your input please

Hey all,

Today is not a post of pictures and all that jazz, but today is a post asking for input from those Gaunts Ghosts fans out there for the fluff side of things, but also for gamers in general for the playability side.

As this title suggests, I am currently working on a N20 half track conversion for my Bloodpact. Where I used the ork truck as a basis for the transports (counts as chimeras) I am using the ork battlewagon for the basis of this conversion. No WIP pics as yet, but currently the base of the wagon is built (that's all I am using from the kit in terms of structure) and I am currently making the plasticard body for it.

So far I'm happy with the progress, but I've come to a point where I didn't do much thinking beyond. In order to really keep building this thing, I need to know what I will be using it as in game terms. In the book, Honour Guard, the N20's that I'm basing this model on are armed with 70 mil Anti-Tank cannons. This leaves me with 2 most fitting options:

1. use this to represent a Leman Russ Vanquisher.
   Armour 14, 13, 10 Rng 72" Str 8 Ap 2 Heavy 1* *extra d6 for armour pen
   155pts

Or-

2. use this to represent a Medusa Siege Cannon with Bastion Breacher shells.
   Armour 12, 10, 10 Rng 48" Str 10 Ap 1 Heavy 1* Blast *extra d6 for armour pen
   140pts (155 if I give it enclosed crew compartment)

Now, that doesn't seem like much of a big deal, but in terms of how I go about making it, it brings up a few dilemmas...

My army is very strongly themed on the books, but in a few areas there is minimal detail given on certain units and vehicles beyond a minor description. When it comes to these things, like all hobbyists doing armies based on novels, movies, etc I try to keep as true to the source as I can. In the book it doesn't specify if the N20 has a fixed gun (like the Medusa) or a gun that can rotate like a turret or even if it has a turret (like the Vanquisher). It doesn't even state whether its open topped or not. In terms of reading its great, leaves a lot to the imagination. In terms of hobby design its good cause gives some freedom to go with what you think. In terms of building a unit for gaming, its giving me headaches....

Sd.Kfz. 251/22 Ausf. D
This is pretty similar to what I have in my mind when I think of the N20 half-track:

Unfortunately it is a model, but its the clearest/best picture showing the gun mount. Its not so much a turret as a pivot point, as the gun only has a 90 degree fire ark.

Sd.Kfz 250/9
The other option, which I'm not too keen on to be honest is to have the turret, such as this:

This gives off too much of an armoured car feel in my opinion, and not a tank killer like the previous.

In terms of what looks like what, the first picture I feel best represents what would be the 'counts-as Medusa' with the 2nd picture best representing (though with a much smaller barrel) a 'counts-as Vanquisher'.

Personally I am more drawn to the Medusa style look of the half-track, though perhaps making the gun smaller and more centrally mounted, so it has the full rotation ark, as well as keeping the shield around the gun.

And so I throw it out to the masses for some input on the following:

1. What do you feel this should count as in game terms
2. Model it based around the 251/22 or the 250/9
3. Any other input for the project.

Let me know your thoughts and will hopefully have some WIP pics up in my next post.

Til then.

----- I will be taking a picture of all the pieces, with list of parts (labeled by number), the quantity of each part, as well as the dimensions prior to assembly so I can make more of these, and pass on the info for anyone who wants to make 1 after seeing the finished product. Instructions of assembly with step-by-step will also be compiled into a doc. Will post up on my blog if requested. -----

Monday, April 11, 2011

Bloodpact Primaris Psyker

Hey all,

I seem to be failing dramatically with the whole "1 post every 1-2weeks" I made a few months back... Life has a habit of getting in the way of things I must say. But despite all this I have made more progress with my Bloodpact, though not so much in the way of pictures...

Anyway back on track now.

I'm sure the Gaunts Ghosts fans out there will remember in the book 'Only in death', where they enter Hinzerhaus and Wes Maggs points out the portrait of the lady in the black dress, and that she is described in a very similar fashion to that of Ulrike, the 'witch' in the Bloodpact team sent to Balhaut in the novel 'Bloodpact'. This character is who I chose to base my Primaris Psyker on.

When it came to deciding on whether to pick a miniature to base the psyker on, or convert my own, I thought back to an old White Dwarf back when the Daemon Hunters codex first came out. In this issue of which I cannot remember the issue number, there were many examples of the WD teams own Inquisitor with henchmen units. 1 of these units included what looked like a witch in portable stocks. I went through the GW online store and there miniatures catalogues searching for what that miniature was based on.

After a hr or so I found it. It was based on 1 of the Undead Banshee miniatures from the WHFB range. I just so happened to be going through the GW online store at the terminal in my local store, so went straight over to the wall that the fantasy range was on. And as luck would have it, they had 1 last banshee in stock, and it was the 1 I wanted.

This miniature looks so good out of the pack, that there was no conversion work needed to achieve the look I was after. All it needed was to be repositioned slightly once on the base, so instead of looking like she is gliding forward, she looks like the power of the warp is surging through her and lifting her into the air. The next thing I had to work out was that she needed was a base that helped her look the part of a 'witch' rather than a banshee. This was done simply by using a small pile of skulls from the Skulls pack that GW sells. Placing her on top of the pile of skulls has raised her a decent amount higher than the rest of my infantry, as well as helping the base to not be as crowded as it would be had she been standing next to it. The rest of the base is done in the same agricultural/industrial area broken concrete and earth look.

When it came to painting her, I didn't want to go down the same road as others have when it comes to highlighting black. All the black highlighting I have seen uses grey tones for the highlighting. That may be well and good for Marines, but when it comes to cloth and material, I think about how real black fabrics are dyed. The dye for making material black will always have a base colour (the colour the black turns to when it fades is the base colour) which will be 1 of these 3 colours- red is more often than not the base colour, blue and green.

As much as using red would help tie in the miniature with the army, that's not what I wanted. Green wouldn't look right with the rest of the army. What I was after was the deep, dark look of a funeral gown. Deep, cold, black. So Blue was the way I had to go. To do this the whole gown was done in black to begin with. Then using enchanted blue I picked out the raised areas on the main gown, and did the same on the under garment using midnight blue. To draw all the colours together I used the Asuryman and Badab washes. Don't let the picture fool you though, it is actually a lot darker than it appears, the flash is just really bright for some reason.

This miniature, being an undead banshee to begin with, has holes in it as little spots of decay, as well as an eye missing. Rather than fill these in, I opted for painting them with a green glow look, to help reflect the raw energy flowing through her. I know its normally depicted as purple/pink in the books, but this small amount of bright green I feel gives off a better quality to the miniature than using purple or pink would.

The hair was done using my airbrush with thinned out skull white. Starting with a black base colour, and working my way from the tips towards the head, I slowly built up the colour, so the hair became darker at the roots. I couldn't remember if her hair colour was mentioned in the books, but I feel that white is fitting. Once that was done, a wash of badab was done to help make individual clumps of hair stand out, then a highlight with a brush was done to pick out the raised areas.

When it came to doing the skulls, I wanted an aged look, similar to that of an animal skeleton you may come across in the bush or forest. Also similar to those of human remains you see in museums and the like. To achieve this, I went with chardon granite as a base, leaving the recessed areas I covered the rest with bleached bone then a fine highlight of skull white to pick up the raised areas only. This was then washed with devlan mud then gryphone sepia. To give the impression of ritual blood magic being done or some such, each skull has had a marking made in my blood mix done to it. Each symbol is different to the next.

The gem on the necklace was picked out in red gore with a blood red highlight, with the necklace itself as well as the bracelet being done in shining gold. Unfortunately at this time I cannot remember how I did the skin, but as I post more of my Bloodpact up I'm sure I will stumble across the method in my notes and so post it then. Once all this was done, and the miniature attached to the base (pinned on through a hole that goes right through the skull pile and out the base, so the whole thing is 1 solid piece), I coated it in Army Painter quickshade strong tone, and once that was dry I sprayed it with some matte varnish.

And there you have it, Ulrike the Witch, my Bloodpact Primaris Psyker.

After such a delay between posts, I wont state what I will blog about next or when, I will just do my best to keep feeding my stuff to you.

Til next time.

Sunday, March 13, 2011

Bloodpact Baneblade Completed Pics

Hey all,
Sorry it took longer than expected, but they are now here, the pictures of my completed Baneblade!

As mentioned in my first post about the Bloodpact Baneblade here, this beast is the first unit I ever did for my Bloodpact. Originally I was just doing it up for something that looked cool, but then as time went on, and my local GW store had a tank camo scheme comp for the release of the current (new at the time) IG codex, the project went from a concept piece right through to the start of a growing Bloodpact force.

Now, the Baneblade kit has a lot to offer for both imperial and traitors alike, but not so much so in the case of the imperial symbols everywhere and the machine spirit shrine at the rear. So first thing I did during the assembly of this beast was to defile all those pieces of Imperial belief adorning it. To further add to the traitorous feel, the vehicles lascannaon, autocannon and heavy bolter barrels have all been modified with pieces from multiple Chaos Vehicle Accessoriess sprue. Spikes made out of paperclips twisted together were added to the hull at random intervals at odd angels to serve as mounting points for the barbed wire I would add later on.

The smoke launchers were replaced with havok launchers, and a tank trap from the Battle Field Accessories Set was attached across the front, not as a dozer blade, but more as a trophy collection point for when the this tank goes on 'crowd control' duties. Extra communication arrays have been added to the side of the turret, with the normally short aerials being replaced with longer lengths of wire.

To make it stand out from other traitor Baneblades, I cut off the battle cannons end, and attached it to the demolisher cannon, more that doubling its length. As my battle cannon now no longer had a barrel end, I attached the Hellhammer cannon barrel end in place of the old 1. To me it makes the tank look that much more deadly, and to emphasis the point that when this cannon fires there is going to be carnage, using a scene from Dan Abnetts book 'Honour Guard', a corpse has been attached to the end of the barrel so that it looks like this guy was attached over the cannon mouth when it fired, leaving his remains dangling, serving as both a message and a trophy.

When it came to trophies and defiling, I kept everything in theme to chaos and more specifically the Bloodpact. So copious amounts of blood, gore, and corpses had to be used. Across the front as seen before I had piled up a mound of guard helmets, and over the machine shrine, I have attached a mutilated guardsmen. I chose to paint him in the same colours as the helmets on the front. Using a knife from the Cadian Heavy Weapons team sprue, and a piece of parchment made out of green stuff, I attached it to his chest, with some line work to make it look like a message is written on it.

To keep with the theme of the Bloodpact recruiting from defeated units of Imperial guard, and to tie it in with the rest of the ground vehicles ive got on the go, the tank was first painted in a 3 colour urban camo scheme. Then once that was completed, I painted on my own blood effect recipe to look like blood has been brushed on by the Bloodpact, as well as spray ups from the corpses crushed under its tracks. Liberal coats were added to the front to emphasis the carnage dealt by this behemoth when it goes on a rampage.

To add to the look that its wet blood splattered over the sides of the tank, I added bloody hand and foot prints leading up and away from each ladder, in the case of the ladder on the tanks side, they lead right up the side of the turret and into the first hatch.

After all the painting was done the barbed wire was added and coated with brown ink to give the rusted look, and the tank commander with hatch were attached into place. I painted this guy seperately as its hard to airbrush his colour on when attached to the tank. Its alot easier to mask up just his hatch rather than the whole turrent piece.

And there you have it, the completed Bloodpact Baneblade in all its traitorous glory.

Until next time all.

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Tervigon WIP (still)

Hello fellow hobbyists!

Yet more WIP pics only, the edited pictures of the completed Baneblade I was to post have been 'misplaced' somewhere on my girlfriends laptop so currently am waiting for the raw pictures to be re-done.

So in the mean time I figured, since there's a lot of hype atm about the Tervigon thanks to the release of the Arachnarok Spider from GW, and over at Dark Future Games Old School Terminator has a Tervigon Scratch Build for $25 going on (currently in parts 1 and 2) as well as having built 1 from combining the Arachnarok Spider with a Carnifex (can be found in parts 1 and 2), I figured it was about time my beast graced the realm of bloggers.

Now, originally this bug was going to be made into something else, something much MUCH bigger (though the leg-span width of this bug is almost equal to the length of a Baneblade, and its as long as a Baneblade is wide), which I still aim to build as soon as I find a polystyrene ball that matches the size of a 1kg Easter egg, but using that design, along with reference pictures of queen ants and spiders, I was able to turn the design away from utter destruction to baby production.

What I needed to do this conversion was the following:
2 x Carnifex kits
Left over Termagaunt
Polystyrene Ball
Florist Wire
Green Stuff
Automotive body filler
Water based Sealer
Hubba Bubba bubble gum wrapper (intact, not ripped apart)

Essentially, the front half is a normally assembled Carnifex, with the exception being that I ground off the nob poking out about its head on the back carapace, and attached a 2nd carapace on the top (after grinding out the insides) with the gap left over being filled with greenstuff and shaped to look like a fleshy sponge of sorts.

At the hip joint, it uses the Carnifex hip, but I have ground off the guide pin and flipped it upside down. This required a bit more thinking than I first thought it would. Once that was done, the tail had to be trimmed off and shaped into a point that I used to stick into the styrene ball. This was then glued on with super glue (prior to this i had coated the ball in many coats of sealer), and then modified 2 Carnifex spine backs to fit around. I put the spine backs on the abdomen rather than the thorax after looking at some footage of tarantulas flicking hairs off there abdomens to dissuade predators, so followed in suit with a similar idea.

Once the body was put together I worked on the legs. For the positioning of the legs, I used the lower of the sets of arm sockets on the Carnifex torso for the front 2 legs, and for the back I created 2 new sockets. So that the legs would support the weight, I had to work out the right stance to put the legs in. For this, I turned to reference pictures of queen ants. Generally they will have 2 longer legs following the length of the body towards the read, with the next set up being more centralized, followed by the front 2 legs being close to the centre also.

I made the legs using a length of florist wire for each as the core, then coated the outside with greenstuff for strength and body, then to make the carapace portion I used and shaped some Body fill from an Automotive Body Repairs shop.

The birthing tube was made using the old wrapper of a bubble gum packet i had lying around. Originally I had emptied the packet from both ends, and sprayed it silver to use in a piece of building terrain hanging down out of the ceiling, but this seemed more a fitting use. I glued 1 end in place, then bent it down over itself, gluing as I went, to form the final shape. Once done and dried in place i coated it with a layer of greenstuff to mold the fleshy look. Once done I then glued in the majority of a Termagaunt body. At this stage I also covered the abdomen of the Tervigon with bulging veins.

This step isn't all that important, but it will explain how I got the shape of the abdomen, considering it started as a ball seeing as I had no polystyrene eggs of the size i needed at the time.

Simply I started to carve an oval shape, using a lemon off the tree for reference, as I didn't want a perfect oval or ending up with an egg. Once I had the general shape I wanted, I took my sisters lighter (she shouldn't be smoking as shes my sister, other people can do what they want) and then using a back and forth motion, moved the ball towards and away from the flame. I did this as the intention wasn't to burn or melt, but to shrink the polystyrene, and doing it in this fashion creates all the random lumps and dints.


Once this was done, I did a positioning on the hip joint, cut a portion off the newly created abdomen so it sat flush once stuck on over the spike I created when making the hip joint. The whole abdomen was then coated in 3-4 good coats of a water based sealer so i could then spray it ready for painting at a later date without damaging the polystyrene.

And there it is, a free standing gaunt producing Tervigon.

The main downside for this thing is that unless the cover is enough to hide a Baneblade, everyone is going to see this thing. It wasn't made for gaming purposes as much as for a conversion comp GW had running for the release of the current Tyranid codex, of which I ended up winning and scoring another Carnifex for my efforts! As it stands, it is still to be painted, as many other projects have gotten in the way, but ill get there eventually.

Til next time all, hope you enjoyed this post.

Thursday, February 24, 2011

Bloodpact army list: Reached a crossroads...

Hey all,

a non-picture/progress report today yet still something of interest, though maybe more so for me than for you, as I am seeking some opinions on what road to go down with a part of my army...

First off, I will type up the list as it stands in its fullness, and then the junction point I am at.

My list is as follows, starting with a 1000pt army for my FLGS monthly tournament, then with the 850pt expansion I have added on to it (turns out Australian tournaments aren't as big as 1850pts, but meh, gives me more to play with).

1000pt list:

HQ-
Command Squad- Commander with B/P and P/S
                           - 4x Guardsmen with L/P and CC/W
                           - Astropath
                           - Fleet Officer

Elites-
Marbo

Troops-
Vet. Squad 1- Harker
                    - 3x Snipers
                    - H/W team consisting of H/B and L/G
                    - 4x Vet. with L/G

Vet. Squad 2- Vet. Sarge with B/P and P/S
                    - 2x Vet. with Melta
                    - Vet. with Heavy Flamer
                    - 6x Vet. with shotguns
                    - Grenadiers doctrine

Platoon Com- P. Comm with with B/P and P/S
                    - 2x Guardsmen with Flamers
                    - 2x Guardsmen with L/P and CC/W

Plat. Squad 1- Commissar
                     - Sarge with B/P and CC/W
                     - Guardsmen with Flamer
                     - 8x Guardsmen with L/G
Plat. Squad 2- Sarge with B/P and CC/W
                     - Guardsmen with Flamer
                     - 8x Guardsmen with L/G
Squads formed together into a single squad of 21

Plat. H/W Squad-3x H/W team each consisting of A/C and L/G

Fast Attack-
Valkyrie- H/B sponsons
             - L/C
             - Missile Pods

S.S.S.- 2x Scout Sentinels
          - 2x Autocannons


Total of 1000pts

That is my current 1000pt army list, and this is the 850pt expansion for it:

Troops-
Plat. Squad 3- Sarge with L/P and CCW
                    - 7x Guardsmen with L/G
                    - H/W team consisting of M/L and L/G
                    + Chimera transport- 2x H/B

Plat. Squad 4- Sarge with L/P and CCW
                     - 7x Guardsmen with L/G
                     - H/W team consisting of M/L and L/G
                     + Chimera transport- 2x H/B

Plat. H/W Squad-3x H/W team each consisting of L/C and L/G

Fast Attack-
Rough Riders- 2x Extra Riders
                    - 2x Riders with Meltas

Heavy Support-
LRBTS- 2x LRBT not upgraded

Art. Bat.- 1x Colossus


Total of 850pts

Now, as the sidebar shows, a lot of this is either still under construction or as yet not started. The extras at the bottom of the list on the sidebar are just that, things that I did either for the sake of fluff, the idea just popped into my head, or because of painting comps/re-thinking my army list.

I'm open up to peoples general views of the list, I have done a few trial games and it seems to run rather well, though I admit it has been a limited arena of versing Daemons and Eldar so far. The general idea behind the list is id rather assault than be assaulted, so the first 1000pt is designed to get in fast and get the job done.

You would be surprised how well a squad of 20 guardsmen with a commissar does in an assault, and the amount of squads they can tie up in an assault at a time. Harker and his boys infiltrating ahead (along with Marbo popping out somewhere) to cause some disruption, the heavier vets being dropped in close to/behind enemy lines to deal some damage, with the main command squad staying out of the way to keep my reserves coming quicker and my opponents more slowly.

The 850 expansion is the armoured follow up, with the squads to move in and secure objectives, some rough riders give a lil extra support vs flanking armour, and some armoured might to push back anyone that's gotten in too close.

My dilemma is as follows:
My army is entirely based on fluff, loosely with the rough riders (you will see why once I have the squad completed, atm very happy with the trial mini), and its the rough riders I'm not too sure about, as well as the sentinels.

The sentinels fit the fluff, as they are being converted into SteG 4 Light Armoured Cars, yet I'm unsure as whether to keep the sentinels, or swap them out for another squad of rough riders, or even swap out the rough riders for more sentinels....

Anyone able to give me some feedback on this, its got me rather stuck...

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Teaser: Origins of my Bloodpact

Hi all,
its time for more Bloodpact pics but unfortunately yet again I have no finished work pics...
This time I forgot to transfer every pic off the USB my girlfriend gave me before she took it back to put more onto...



So today I dug through my computers archives in search of pics from a project I started when the kit first came out yet didn't finish about a year ago, a year before any actual work on my Bloodpact started.


This is purely a teaser post today for what you should expect in my next post on this, and also hopefully work towards giving insight in to the origins of my Bloodpact forces theme and style.

Til next time!

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

Bloodpact Looted Truck Finished pics

Hello again fellow hobbyists,
I have returned with what was promised, pictures of the completed truck!

I'll run through a list of the additions that were made before and after I started painting that aren't shown in the WIP pictures in the previous blog, and if theres anything I haven't listed that takes your interest just comment me. I can't quite recall how I achieved the colours atm but if asked I'm sure I can go dig up some paints list from somewhere.

First off is the obvious barbed wire, which was added right in the final stages of painting. Its the standard GW wire with just brown ink dabbed on straight out of the pot. I do this with the barbed wire on my other vehicles and on the bases of my infantry also, as I find it gives a better aged look to the wire compared to if i watered it down. Also in this picture you can clearly see the grill at the front of the engine bay. This was achieved by sticking in bits of wire I had cut to size.

Second of the extra bits of detail is the rivets, the truck is literally covered in them. I did these following the instructions in the tutorial done by the Painting Corps, the link of which is here. Its not as hard as you would think, and no where near as time consuming as it looks. The instructions they give are very clear and easy to follow, so as long as you don't rush yourself it will come up great.

The next addition on the list was added after the main portion of the painting was done, and that's the patches of rust that cover the vehicle. Every place that has the potential to rust, has portions of rust on it. Where the rust is coming through the paint, I have used the rust effects to stain the paint. The chains holding the bench seats up, the hinges on the pintle heavy bolter, on the wheel hubs, metal plates on the wheels, everywhere. This was achieved by using a product called Scenic Rust made by Deluxe Materials. I will do a tutorial on how to use this stuff soon, as I'll soon have a few things ready to get rusted up.

This vehicle is definitely a veteran of the years, so along with the rust and old looking paint job, when it came to doing the tyres and the camo tarp I made sure that they looked old and weathered. I wanted this vehicle to look like its been neglected, perhaps salvaged after a battle or when its driver turned traitor he bought the truck into the bargain, and definitely not like its fresh off the assembly line.

The final touch to firmly place this vehicle in the Bloodpact parking lot is the addition of the most defining aspect about them: blood. Across the front is blood splatter from all the victims too slow to get out of its way, on the handles and steps is blood from boots and hands, and the tray has clotted blood strewn across the mesh, be it from the transported troops or slaughtered victims is any ones guess. The clotted look was achieved thanks to the contact adhesive i used to attach the mesh. It clumped up and leaked through the mesh and settled on top, and added into the bargain, it did so randomly.

There you have it, the completed Bloodpact looted truck, which will be used to represent a Chimera in my Bloodpact force. Comments and questions as always are welcomed.

Thursday, February 3, 2011

Bloodpact Looted Truck WIP pics

Hey all,
I finally got some pics off my girlfriends laptop, not any of my finished product pics but in fact some WIP of the Bloodpact truck I finished a few months back, plans courtesy of Dave Taylors blog, just search under the lable 'Truck' for the templates i believe it is.

I followed the instructions and used the templates for the most part, but found that after i had started painting it, that i had forgotten to put a few of the extra armour and the access into the engine bay! Oh well....

During assembly, modified the plans to suit my vision of what I wanted the truck to look like. The modicifactions I made include the following:
- I made the benches fold down benches rather than fixed, as I didnt want this to look purely like a troop transport vehicle.
- I made the canopy casing over the tray of the truck more like 1 of the troop carriers from WW2, having a skeleton frame going from 1 side to the other, so when the tarp is pulled over the top it creates a box effect over the tray.
- Rather than a plank style floor in the back, I have used plastic fly-wire to represent a metal grated floor, for extra grip when moving around. I also used this material bundled up on 1 side of the tray to represent the roof tarp, which can also be used in game as camo netting if desired.
- More handles poking out of the sides of the truck and tray, and a small ladder to 1 side of the trays rear, like transport trucks of today, allowing for a trailer to be towed if the driver was so inclined.
- No lights on the truck except for the search light on top, but this was purely due to a lack of lights in my bits box I must say.
- And a piece of mesh on 1 side for some extra armour.
The weapons on there are purely cause im not much of a fan of the multilaser, not sure why really, but felt that since im doing a looted ministorum (hope I spelt that right) transport, that the Bloodpact would have afixed weapons to the vehicle in a some what unprofessional manner, so all heavy bolters.
There is more done do it, but not applicable to the WIP pictures, as the other touches were added during and after the painting process.

Other than those few little details, the whole thing was constructed as the instructions said to do so. Thanks to Dave for the templates and instructions on how to build this beast, couldnt of figured out how to do 1 without them.

Next time, pictures of the fully painted up Blootpact Looted Truck.

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

New Years Hobby Resolution (Belated)

Heya all,

My sincere apologies for lack of posts on here of late, getting up at 3:30am for work leads to much of the time once I'm back home being used for lounging or hobby followed by much sleep. As you can see, not much room for blogging in there at all, if any.

Alas as yet i have no pictures to show... It turns out my camera believes that zoom is for distance shots, not for close ups, so i am awaiting the time when my lovely girl-friend has a spare moment to snap up a few pics with her more competent camera...

Now that's out of the way its down to business!

As the title suggests, like many others out there i am resolving to make some changes in how my hobby is being approached, IE getting stuff either started/finished with pics taken along the way, with more regular blogging added into the bargain.

I already have a list on my main page of the current projects i have under way, yet even that is incomplete...
So here i will list briefly what i aim to do this year, and some deadlines i can hopefully live up to.

#1 is my Bloodpact Traitor Guard.
i have many units started or planned out, and a few finished, all yet to have pictures taken and posted up. My first goal here is going to be to finish off my 2 veteran squads assembly, and then post some pics up as i have a few test models done for the paint scheme of 1 squad, and the other just needs 2 more guys assembled and painted as the rest are already done but for basing.
After that, i will endeavour to get 1 unit/vehicle assembled/painted a week, with pictures happening regularly.

#2 is my Tyranid Vanguard swarm
i haven't worked on this army since the last edition of the codex, kinda lost interest once it became apparent my whole army couldn't start off board via the scouting rules. A whole army of genestealers, all in assault range as soon as they came on the board. That army had a total of 7/7 wins, in games ranging from 750 points 1v1 to a big 1500pt each 1v1v1v1 game.
With the current codex i have had to include new units and revamp my strategies a fair bit. So first on the agenda there is to work out what i will take in this force and to modify my to do list to reflect that.

#3 is my Dark Elves raiding force
A few weeks ago i started a Dark Elves force based around a campaign of raiding the warhammer fantasy globe. So the army consists of lots of corsairs, a few spearmen n repeater crossbows, dark riders and shades for the vanguard, and reaper bolt throwers for ship based artillery, all led by Felheart and some other lordly master funding the campaign.
That of course is just a basic run down, the force is full of conversion ideas i am yet to put to paper, suffice to say trophies from around the globe will be very apparent.

As more ideas and projects come along i will of course add them to the list.

As for time line, I'm hoping to work to this:

March       - Finished off assembling Bloodpact as bare minimum
April/May - Bloodpact completely finished
                 - Tyranids finished assembly
June/July    - Tyranids finished completely
                 - Dark Elves finished assembly
September - Dark Elves finished completely

A very rough guide line, but 1 i can hopefully live to if not beat!

Til next time, hopefully within a week or 2, AND with stuff to blog about.