Shout out - Dreamforge Games Kickstarter!

As some of you are aware, Mark Mondragon of Dreamforge Games is currently running a Kickstarter to get his jaw-droppinly awesome Leviathan Crusader (and Eisenkern troopers) tooled in plastic. I unforuntately missed out on the resin kits he did a few months back but am all over the opportunity to get in on the KS deal he has going.

For an incredibly reasonable $89 you can get the plastic version of the Leviathan, which is an absolute steal! In addition, the Eisenkern infantry are available for a modest $20, and the stretch goals add all sorts of upgrades. He's also offering a multitude of alternate weapon options as further stretch goal rewards, all of which are swappable on the Leviathan kit. If the Kickstarter really goes well, he's looking at re-tooling the Leviathan Mortis in plastic as well!

There's still almost two weeks left on the Kickstarter, so there's plenty of time to get in on the action - I'm really hoping to see this take off, as Mark's work is absolutely top notch, and I'm looking forward to seeing more of his work!

Check it out!

Imperial Guard - Chimeras painted, and the Motor Pool

Oof! Finally getting back into the swing of things after a little vacation out to GenCon and a mess of work projects eating up my time. Gencon was a blast, and though I completely failed to bring my camera with me, my buddy Dave took a mess of pictures and is getting them up on his blog. Highlights of the con included a lovely chat with Mike McVey about Sedition Wars and reminiscing about 'the good old days' of 40k, and an interesting discussion with Mister Justin from Secret Weapon Miniatures about weathering powders and other modeling tips and techniques - great guy!. Played some West End Games D6 Star Wars ('an elegant system from a more civilized age'), as well as some Rogue Trader, Black Crusade, and an absolutely hysterical Ork miniatures racing event called "Formula Waaagh" that had us all rolling with laughter. Suffice it to say the most commonly heard comment from the announcer's booth was "Tumbling end over end"... Hah!

I spent far too much money in the Dealer Hall this year - after the first pass I felt like I'd been mugged! The Fantasy Flight Games booth got me the worst, there were seven 40K:RPG books of various varieties that I had never seen and apparently couldn't live without. The Secret Weapon Miniatures booth got me as well, including a rather cool Generatorium that I had to put together and paint as soon as I got home...

Since I've been home I haven't done a whole lot of painting, though I have definitely been doing a fair bit of building! I dug out the big ol' box o' Chimeras that have been lurking in the Closet of Doom and set about building all the tanks that the Mordian 7th so desperately needed!

I have to say that when it comes right down to it, I'm a tread-head. I love tanks, and the guard really does give one the greatest variation of choices. That, coupled with my love of conversions means that virtually every tank for the glorious 7th is modified in one way or another. Granted, at the moment the majority of them are just primered black which means it's hard to make out details, but there will be more and better pics in the near future! While there are a couple more Leman Russ variants yet to build, the motor pool currently stands at 4 Chimeras (using Blood and Skulls Industries alternate kit), a Medusa (using the MaxMini cannon), a pair of Charybdis Assault Launchers (proxy Griffons, similar to what I've built in the past), a Devil Dog, a Manticore, a Vanquisher, and a slightly alternate build on a Vendetta. That's a mess of armor!

Over the past weekend I did manage to batch paint up a trio of Chimeras for 1st Platoon, though the pictures turned out fairly poor. Of eight I took, only this one turned out. More pics to follow once I figure out what I did to the camera's machine spirit to make it so angry!

Still a long way to go before the motor pool is finished, but I'm looking forward to painting more tanks!

Gencon Bound!

No exciting miniature news this week, Real Life (tm) has been incredibly busy - on the other hand, I'm now on vacation for the next week! Heading out to GenCon tomorrow for four days of gaming goodness!

We're pulling in on Wednesday afternoon - if any of you fine folks wants to get together for a cocktail and a nosh sometime during the con, drop me a line at moonlight (at) cold-moon.com and we'll figure out a time to meet up! Unfortunately there's not a lot of 40k going at the con this year apparently, though we'll be playing Formula Waaagh at 9am on Saturday so there will at least be some Orky racing mayhem!

Good times will be had by all!

Adeptus Mechanicus - Archmagos Strandax painted

Speaking of insectile styling, I fixed up the last few things I missed earlier on Archmagos Standax. The army is going to be filled with Conversion Beamers, it seems!

 

I'm more pleased with how this one turned out compared to Malevolus. He's a bit more subdued in color and quite a bit more dynamically posed. In game he's also a bit more fearsome - The servo-harness gives him a pair of servo arm attacks, plus a Conversion Beamer (of course) and a plasma burner. His Sagittarii mount makes him Relentless, and the Omnissian Axe is +1S AP2 Unwieldy. Haywire - definitely a vehicle killer at all ranges!

 

Though I haven't been able to order them yet, Blight Wheel miniatures does another spider-bot which I'm planning to use as the carriage for the heavy weapons teams, which should really tie the whole army together. Got a ten-man squad of Hypaspists up on the painting table next - definitely need to get some Troops choices for the army done!

Adeptus Mechanicus - Myrmidae Centurius painted

I recently sat down and re-thought the overall aesthetic for the Ad-Mech army and penciled together an overall army plan. With Archmagos Strandax being mounted on a spider-esque lower torso, and the intention for the heavy weapons teams to be a spider style weapon carriage and a ballisterai minder using some other Blight Wheel miniatures, I was reminded of a model I'd cobbled together ages ago...

November 2009, in point of fact. The current edition of the Cult Mechanicus codex continues to include the Divisio Myrmidae Centurius Assault Engines - in the previous incarnation of the Ad-Mech I'd built one from a Defiler kit, and this test build ended up sitting on a shelf for three years. In the current edition the assault engines are now a monstrous creature and since I felt the size of the Defiler was a bit overboard, I figured this slightly smaller version would work a treat. I happened to have several more boxes of the bits that went into making the one above, so I cranked out another two!

 

The Centurius is armed with a Heavy Conversion Beamer and a rather fearsome close combat weapon, and have the option to exchange the CCW for another Beamer, so I figured two fire support Centurions and one Centurius Ultima would do nicely. A friend of mine was kind enough to donate a couple flying bases, which worked out well.

 

The twins are designed for heavy fire support, and will generally lurk in the backfield attempting to lay down long range fire to take advantage of the particular effects of the Conversion Beamers. They also have the option of upgrading to a Helical Targeting Array, giving them the Interceptor and Night Vision traits, meaning they are a threat to any encroaching Deep Strikers. Although they give up the dedicated CCW weapon, they are still no slouches in melee, with three attacks at S6, coupled with the monstrous creature rules.

 

The 'sergeant' of the Centuria is given the "Ultima Pattern" upgrade, giving it a +1 to WS/BS, and Mechadendrites for an additional +D3 attacks. While it doesn't actually have more wounds or a higher toughness, I thought some leg armor would help him stand out a bit.

 

All in all a fun set of models to build and paint, and I think the sizing is more appropriate for its stat line. They're not small, by any means, but it's not enormous like the one built from Defiler kit.

Ave Omnissiah!

Adeptus Mechanicus - Urtzi Malevolus, the Despoiler of Mars painted

It's been a little touch and go over the last week so there hasn't been much in the way of hobby time. In fact I've only managed to paint two miniatures the whole time. I did manage to get some pics, though they did highlight the fact that one of the two minis really needed more work - isn't that always the case? Nevertheless, Urtzi Malevolus, the Despoiler of Mars is now complete!

 

I went with a more muted palette for Urtzi, dark reds, lots of grimy metal, and purplish, unhealthy skin tones. The yellow and blue spot colors help the model pop a bit, and my friend's suggestion to do the mechadendrites in a blued steel ended up working rather well.

 

In game, Urtzi is armed with a number of servo-arms, mechadendrites, fabricator gauntlets and other esoteric equipment. Not entirely sure how he'll actually work on the table, as I have yet to play a game with the new Tempus Fugitives Codex Cult Mechanicus, but in theory one doesn't want to get within range of all those  snippy-snappy claws!

He also allows for the use of Dark Mechanicus allies, though if he is included the army is not allowed to take certain other 'puritan' Ad-Mech choices such as the Omniscion or Archmagos Veneratus Kane (who was around when Urtzi was condemned for his actions and was forced to flee Mars during the Horus Heresy). I'm eagerly awaiting the update of the Codex Dark Mechanicus, as I'm sure I'll enjoy building a unit or two of heretical machines!

Pics of Archmagos Strandax (the arachno-styled tech priest) will follow soon once I get the last little fiddly bits touched up!