Heresy Era Thousand Sons - Heavy support assembly

Haven't had a great deal of hobby time over the last week, Real Life(tm) has taken more than its fair share! Nevertheless, I've slowly been soldiering on behind the scenes on the Thousand Sons and figured I'd share some build pics.

First up is a whirlwind scorpius, I absolutely love the homage to the original missile launcher from good ol' RTB-01. In fact, I plan on including a heavy support squad armed with missile launchers to match!

I'm also pretty jazzed with the deimos predator executioner. Love my guard executioner and figure it's a no-brainer to have one crewed by marines!

I actually liked it enough that I'm going to have a pair of 'em! This one is built as a command tank for what I eventually plan to make a three strong squadron. The deimos kit was actually surprisingly easy to build, I have to say it was probably the most trouble-free design from FW that I've built in quite some time.

While I was about it, I also banged together a couple lascannons for the Spireguard, using some leftover bits from the Iron Hand sicarans, and the carriages from Curious Constructs which I think work a treat!

The majority of the army is still on hold while I await the bases - my indecision has meant that while I have all the bits to make the models, I have nothing to actually put them on so I've been in a holding pattern, argh. This coming week brings the release of the Imperial Knight kit, so expect to see some towering monstrosities here this weekend!

Orks - Deff Korps uv Krieg Shoota Boyz painted

It had been incredibly cold and snowy for the last few weeks and during that time while I'd built all sorts of stuff, it was far to cold to primer any thing and my hobby output sort of ground to a halt. However, a beautiful Colorado day appeared and I undertook a frenzy of primering. So that means it's time for da boyz!

Taking a cue from Colonel Scipio's excellent DKoK, I went with a predominantly brown leather look, with a bit of grey on the helmets to tie them in to the grey armor plating that will be on the various vehicles.

Two ten-man squads will go in the pair of half-trakks, and careen around the battlefield blasting away with their shootas until they inevitably get their ride blown out from under them and bewildered orks are tossed in all directions.

That's the troops choices sorted out - Jobs a good 'un!

 

While I was about it, i also put a brush to the warboss model, which is just chock full of character. I went with a red sandstone sort of look for the bases, which sets off reasonably well against the blue-grey of the models, but I found my usual reddish-brown base rims just looked poor. Black rims it is!

In other news:

Son of a..!

I'm in for a half dozen of these, and that's no lie.

Heresy Era Thousand Sons - Prospero Spireguard test minis

As the wait for the orks drags on (now a week beyond the original delivery window), I spent a little time fiddling around making some Prospero Spireguard to accompany the Thousand Sons in their defense of Tizca. In the book A Thousand Sons, they are described as wearing crimson greatcoats, heavy boots and silver shakoes lined with fur cut from the wings of the snow-shrikes, an indigenous bird used by the Avenians as weapons. Officers were noted to wear crimson jackets decorated with brass buttons and gold frogging. They were also outfitted with silver helmets, curved sabres and laspistols.

I had a bit of a rummage around in the Closet of Doom and pulled out some various bits and bobs and before I knew it I had a command squad built and painted. After spending so much time batch painting, doing these five guys took almost no time at all! I'm not happy with the GW head mixed in with the Perry Miniatures heads, as he ends up looking bulbous or the other all look a bit pin-headed. For the 'real' build they'll all get Perry heads, so they all match up scale-wise.

I'm still trying to find a good set of bases that I want to use for the Thousand Sons and by extension the Spireguard. In the meantime they just got the basic mud and grass - worst case scenario, they'll match my 40k guard and can be used as an allied contingent of some variety there!

Put together a couple basic troopers wearing shakos as well, then ran out of bits. Doh! These are all just proof of concept miniatures however, and based on how they turned out I ordered a mess of bits from Maxmini (torsos), Victoria Lamb (arms), Blight Wheel (legs) and Perry Miniatures (heads). The packages are starting to trickle in, so there will be plenty more to come!

Heresy Era Thousand Sons - Malcador painting in progress

While waiting for the package of Orky goodness to arrive (shipping from poland takes ages), I have been dabbling with the next heresy-era project where I'm going back to my first 30k love, the Thousand Sons! The plan is to do a primary detachment of Sons, and an allied Imperial Army detachment where I'm going to be kitbashing up some Prosperine Spireguard. ...And while waiting for the packages of bits for them to show up, I dove in on what will be the centerpiece of the Spireguard force, a Malcador Assault Tank!

Just laying on the base colors thus far, still a long way to go. Going with the usual recipe of red, bone and gold - really enjoyed being able to play with some colors after doing the Iron Hands! I went for the Malcador mostly because I've never tried my hand at one before, and to be honest in 40k the tank is somewhat lacklustre. However, in the 30k era, the munitorum and mechanicus were up to the task of keeping it maintained, which means that it is a Fast superheavy. 12" a turn, and can fire everything as though it was stationary (at different targets, to boot). What's not to like?

Having had a chance to work on this one, I'm definitely interested in pickup up a Valdor at some point in the future! I've banged out a couple test models for the Spireguard as well, pics to follow soon!

Orks - Deff Korps uv Krieg Half-Trakks built

The ork army continues apace - while we're been suffering through some surprisingly heavy snowfall, I've spent the time building a pair of transports for the shoota boyz squads.

I wanted to keep the quasi Germanic feel with the Trukks, and picked up a couple resin kits from Forge World and ended up combining them, making what proved to be my least cost effective dollars-to-points-value models of all time! Quite pleased with how they look, though!

Of course, the two models would have ended up exactly the same if I followed the directions in their entirety, so I tried to deviate from the norm a bit on both of them with some varying decorative bits.

Some extra armor plates and a tow chain on the back breaks up the look a bit. I'll definitely need to paint various armor plates in different colors when the time comes as well.

Overall I quite like 'em! The halftracks tie in well with the Battlewagon, hopefully giving the whole force a cohesive (yet ramshackle) look! ...Now if it would only warm up enough to primer 'em!

Orks - Deff Korps uv Krieg Battlewagon

Brief break in the Memphis pics to appease the roars from Mork (or possibly Gork) to post some shots of the first vehicle for Da Deff Korps uv Krieg that I finished recently.

Decided to go with a quasi German grey for the vehicles, albeit a very worn and weathered one. There's been a number of weathering techniques I've been wanting to try, but weren't really suitable for use on the Iron Hands.

The whole model was primered black, then given an all-over drybrushing of Boltgun metal. After that I went in and stippled in Sombre Grey, leaving the edges and corners with the metal showing through. I then hit a couple of the panels in Stonewall Grey. Once that was done, the whole model was given a black wash to dirty it up. The tracks and tires were given a heavy drybrush of Dark Flesh, followed by a lighter drybrush of Leather Brown and a Strong Tone wash. Once that dried, they were given a light drybrush of Boltgun metal (to represent the areas where the mud has worn away).

I tried out a sponged-on rust effect in a couple areas, starting with Charred Brown followed by a lighter sponge pass with Dark Fleshtone. Next was an even lighter sponge of Hot Orange, and then the extreme edges were drybrushed with metal. In retrospect I think it could have stood to have one more pass with Fiery Orange to help it pop a bit more, though.

Finally, I tried out the 'painted on scratches' thing here and there on some open areas that hadn't gotten the rust treatment. They're scattered throughout, though I'm still struggling with how many and where they ought to be applied. Figured I'm better off with a 'less is more' approach to start with.

Overall, I'm chuffed to bits with how it's turned out, and I can't wait to get to grips with the rest of the army! The Forge World order showed up, so a pair of half-trakks are soon to follow!

Going down to Memphis, Part 3 - A walk down memory lane

Third of four posts on the Memphis trip, this time around all the pics are concentrated on a pair of cabinets tucked away in the back hallway. It was a wonderful trip down the halls of memories for me for sure!

 

It was amusing to go through the case with by buddy Dave saying "Had that... Had that... Several of those.."

Battlefleet Gothic was a blast, but sadly my local group never really got into it. Still have an Imperial and an Eldar fleet banging around in the Closet of Doom.

These two really tripped my nostalgia trigger. Adeptus Titanicus was sadly missing from the display, but I had multiple copies  of both of these back in the day. How I wish I still did! Sadly the pic of the next shelf down didn't turn out, but it held my favorite Specialist Game of all time - Necromunda!

 

The original Space Hulk, DeathWing and Genestealer were played hundreds of times with the neighbor kids when I was growing up. Still have the yellow book, but neither Dave nor I had ever seen that "Space Marine Assault" box before. Was quite a shock!

Gorkamorka and Digganob were interesting, but I only ever played it one time. Loved the vehicle rules, but the setting didn't grab me as much as its big brother Necromunda did.

The old Horus Heresy boardgame! Never owned it myself, but played a friends copy several times. On the stack to the right, the Rogue Trader rulebook (sadly buried in the back, for some reason), the red Compendium (which holds the genesis of the Mordian 7th), and a 2nd ed Battle manual.

In the next cabinet was a bunch of old boxes of minis. Loved seeing the RT-era Devastators box again. Squat mole mortar, guard tarantula and a marine land speeder all in one set! ...For some reason.

Speaking of Squats, front and center in the middle of the cabinet. Bam! Still have half a box of these guys lurking in the CoD.

Back in the rear right is the first box I ever bought. Good old RTB001! I remember that day vividly, when I first saw the box and the Rogue Trader book in The Game Keeper, a store that no longer exists in a mall that has also been bulldozed and rebuilt (more than a decade ago, now). The late 80's came rushing back!

A selection of older and well not newer, but less older boxes. The old Predator box is lurking in the back there, really loved that old kit!

This shelf really made me remember the 'good old days'. Three Rhinos in a box for twenty bucks. ...And TWO Land Raiders for not much more!

While the original Rogue Trader rulebook was down in the bottom of one cabinet, they had a nice walk through time in the next one. 2nd Edition was mental, unbalanced, and a hell of a lot of fun. I think it's still my favorite edition, though I'll readily admit that's likely rose-colored glasses, as I haven't actually played a 2nd ed game in going on twenty years.

3rd Edition didn't really leave much of an impression on me. Couldn't tell you the difference between 3rd and 4th at this point, other than it felt rather watered down following the insane asylum that was 2nd. I do think that 5th and now 6th editions were much better systems, but when all is said and done Rogue Trader and 2nd Ed will always hold 1st and 2nd place on the podium for me!

One more post coming up with some pics from the games that Dave and I got into while we were there...