The last of the Crimson Fists - Part 5

Let me preface this post with the comment that I absolutely dread/despise using waterslide transfers. Granted, for a long time I wasn't using the appropriate tools, methods or materials to do so, but to this day (and with the use of MicroSol, MicroSet, hot water, long soaks, trimming and slicing, you name it) I haven't really mastered the art of setting transfers over the curved marine shoulder pads and more often than not they just don't set correctly. In any case, I took another swing at it on a handful of the models yesterday and managed to pull off a couple squads with only minor blemishes:

 

First up, the squad of Terminators. These models turned out to be the best of the bunch so far, the various washes toned down the harshness of the highlights, and the transfers all more or less cooperated. Unfortunately after I sprayed these few squads I discovered that I didn't get the right matte sealant, so I'm hoping that another coat with the correct stuff won't screw them up.

 

Next up is good ol' Pedro Kantor, and a command squad that he technically can't have. Upon closer inspection of the codex, he's only allowed an honor guard squad which conversely are unable to be armed in the same fashion as the command squad. Argh. To be fair, the one time I've actually fielded the Crimson Fists, I fielded the Pedro Kantor model as a generic Captain armed with a Storm Bolter and Power Fist. For some reason, a couple of the shoulder transfers rippled up a bit on these models at the matte sealant stage, likely due to a combination of insufficient micro-sol and the incorrect sealer. Ah well, practice makes perfect!

 

I also knocked out a trio of Sergeants that will likely need their shoulder pads redone as well. It's at this point where I wonder whether attempting to freehand 25 more fists would be more or less aggravating than doing 25 more transfers. Of course, since I've started with the transfers I'm more or less compelled to finish the rest of the army in the same way for continuity's sake.

A few more bits of forward progress as well! The Land Speeder Storm was actually rather fun to put together - I opted for the Assault Cannon  upgrade, and moved the Cerberus Launcher to the top rail, which I think turned out pretty decent. I also got a bit of paint on the Dreadnought and the Drop Pod, which were a nice change of pace from dozens of infantry!

So far so good! Things are starting to turn green on the chart, and as it stands the army comes in at a respectable 1977 points, which leaves room for a bit of wargear juggling. Once they're all painted I'm hoping to stage a battle report against my Guard and get some shots of a fully painted game (which doesn't happen very often around here)!