Work in Progress - Alpha Legion Kill Team

Here's something I recently rediscovered - the start of an Alpha Legion Kill Team:

I thought I'd put up some pictures of a work-in-progress project I'm planning on working soon - a squad of approximately 8 Adeptus Astartes plus a Dreadnought (the Forgeworld Ironclad). The plan is to have each member of the squad to look very similar - in power armour marks, equipment and so on, with various details seeming slightly "off" - with this leader for example, his plasma pistol is non-standard, having been taken from the previously limited edition Inquisitor Gideon Lorr, but overall they will be "clean" enough to operate within the ranks of the Imperial Guard as a squad from a Loyalist Chapter.

The power sword on the leader is taken from an Eldar Figure (probably a Howling Banshee) - again suggesting non-standard (read: non-Imperial) technology origins. 

Here's the first standard member of the squad, armed with a heavily modified bolter and short axe. Arms come from the Chaos Marine kits with extraneous spikes and other details removed. I will be moving these across to 30mm or 32mm bases when I return to work on the squad. I've used liquid greenstuff on the legs of this particular marine.

Looking at these pictures really makes me want to get back to these - perhaps once I get a few of my current projects completed I can return to build the rest of the squad and decide how to arm that Dreadnought!

Dark Vengeance

Bloody brilliant! Dark Vengeance pictures have been online for a week or two now, and I have some favourites...

I'm gona need about 60 of the Chaos Cultists - I have a million and one ideas for their use buzzing about in my head...

1. Frateris Militia - I have some gasmask heads with turbans from Ramshackle Games that would suit these figures well - I'd lop off their heads, replace them, remove any chaotic icons, add prayer script/purity seals/personal Imperial icons. They're basically cultists for the Imperial Church, so these fit well.
2. Redemptionists - similar conversion, with various different masked heads instead. 
3. Ash Waste/Desert Nomads - probably the least converting required - maybe more shawls and water bottles, everyone gets a gas mask/rebreather.
4. Imperial Workers Militia/Scratch Company - like the ones from Necropolis. Formed from loyalist Imperial civilians who have banded together to resist invasion from . I'd swap in some bare heads, maybes some Lasguns on a few of them.
5. Genestealer cultists - again, head swaps, new icons, pretty much done!
6. ...and so on! Anyone have other suggestions?

This guy may be my favourite of the lot. The gloves and tabard really make it. I'd love to see him with the masked head removed and a hairy flagellant head (with sculpted mask) added!

I absolutely love the Chaos side of this set - on the plus side for Dark Angels players, it's going to be amazingly easy to start up a new force - I can see eBay being flooded with that side of the box. It kind of sucks that today is payday and the pre-orders have gone online on every webstore! Must. Not. Purchase!

Space Hulk Termie

The picture showed a few things I'll be altering, and he still needs some rust adding to the base, but another Terminator down, 6 and the Broodlord left to go!


I never seem to have any energy for painting at the moment - I am planning a lazy day on Sunday when I'll be attempting to finish off a bunch of different almost-complete miniatures that I currently have on my desk!

Un-bloody-employed.

Well, I should be posting up here a tad more frequently - I received a call on Friday morning letting me know I no longer have a job. Bugger.


Oh well - in my (slightly-put-on) depression I've been working on a few different projects...

Space Hulk Genestealers - These have a bit more paint on them since the last time they were shown - namely, the metallic bases blocked out and the basecoat on the fleshy skin. Once I've finished all of these apart from the Broodlord, I'm going to go back and add blood, rust and various other interesting markings to the bases of the lot of them. I've also decided to include at least one other Marine Chapter on the bases - probably Lamenters, given their links with the Blood Angels and their scheme. Just to add another splash of (admittedly rusted to hell, grimy and generally mucky) colour.

Space Marine vehicles - I decided that my Marines were lacking in vehicular support and had the urge to rebuild some in-artfully assembled cheap eBay rescues. I've done a good amount of cleaning up on the Land Speeder, with another two soaking in paint stripper at the moment, whilst the Rhino (that will become either a Whirlwind or a Razorback - I'm leaning towards Razorback) was taking a bit more elbow grease. I'm going to keep the console out of the Rhino chassis and replace it with a slice of plasticard - the piece is too cool to be hidden away inside the tank.  

Wych which scheme? This Wych scheme. Dodgy photo, but I'm sure you'll get the idea - pale pastel purple and mithril/chainmail armour with bone weapons. Very cold, splatters of blood here and there - I'm happy with the way this is going.

Once an Imperial Dreadnought, then converted into a Chaos Dreadnought, this poor guy is once again to be returned to Imperial glory! I'm thinking as an Ironclad...


That's about it really. I am looking for jobs rather diligently, but have quite a bit of time on my hands, hence the hundred different projects running at once. Oh, I also finally picked up my terrain building stuff at home, in the hopes of building some Necromunda-ish platform terrain, themed around Fallout, Borderlands and the kind of waste-worlds and border moons you would find on the Eastern Fringe in the Warhammer 40000 universe. Should be splendid, if I ever get to it!

The Spoils of Wargaming: Marine Reinforcements

I've been on a little bit of an Astartes fix recently - I've been reading various Black Library books revolving around the Space Marines. I also purchased Horus Heresy: Collected Visions and I also had a chance to read through the Badab War books from Forgeworld - I'd highly recommend them all and they've left me needing to build various interesting characters for my Shadow Wraith Marines. Hence picking up a few bits and pieces recently...

Grey Knight bits - assorted interesting bits from the new Grey Knights kits. 

Sanguinary Guard torsos - these will be brilliant for kitbashing some interesting heroes for my Marines.

Forgeworld Bolters - I've had these (and the few that are missing from the pic) for a little while now, absolutely brilliant and detailed bits - these will be for rearming my Sternguard. I also have some plans cooking for some decent Bolter-Meltas.

I've also received a Rhino and a Land Speeder, with two other Land Speeders on the way, as well as some bits to repair them. Lots of Marines on the way...

Codicer Tarkus, Librarian of the Shadow Wraiths Astartes Chapter

As a child, Andron Tarkus was chosen by the roving Librarium of the Shadow Wraith Astartes Chapter from the nomad tribes that journeyed the ash wastelands of the world of his birth. His psychic prowess had been venerated by a number of different tribes, who spoke of his powers whilst trading with the walled cities of the planet, where word inevitably reached agents of the Inquisition.


As the Inquisition finally managed to track down the convoy transporting the child, a stranger who had joined the nomads finally revealed himself to be one of the Emperor's chosen servants - an Astartes of the Shadow Wraiths Chapter and a fellow psychic. A confrontation broke out between the Astartes and the Inquistion, which was thankfully resolved without physical confrontation. The Marine had been directed to the tribe by the predictions of the Chief Librarian of the Shadow Wraiths, who had foreseen the coming of his eventual successor...


Tarkus has since undergone the trials, genemods and surgery needed to become a fully-fledged Astartes, serving the Chapter faithfully for over four decades. Brother Tarkus has been graded at a beta-plus psyk-level, with a high proficiency in pyrokinetics and can often be found on a battlefield with his forcesword Ignis wreathed in conjured ethereal flames.


The robe he wears marks him out as a member of the Chapter Master's Guard, an elite group that accompany the Chapter Master into battle and may be called on to act as his proxy when needed.


----------------------------------------------


This guy has been painted for a couple of weeks now - it's a conversion I did when I first got back into the hobby a few years ago, Ezekiel of the Dark Angels with a new sword (I'd thriftily bought him online, missing his sword and hands (they were all one piece) for about 75p as I've always loved the miniature...), some symbols removed and a new paintjob. I do love to be thrifty when it comes to games - I love getting a bargain, which may be why I have tons of unpainted "bargains" cluttering up my apartment...


He's been put together, undercoated and basecoated for about 2 years! I have a Sternguard squad in a similar style (using the Dark Angels robed veterans) that has been undercoated for a similar amount of time, with a couple of them finished. I recently bought some of the Forgeworld bolters that look perfect for Sternguard, so I may actually go back and replace their arms.

Honoured Brother Marcena of the Shadow Wraith Astartes

Brother Marcena, a renowned Captain of the Shadow Wraiths, was interred into one of the Chapter's prized Dreadnoughts after the Battle for Aquae Garrian. 

During the battle, the Astartes Captain distinguished himself in holding the main sallyport on the island fortress against numerous waves of Archenemy footsoldiers and war-engines. The Captain had been seperated from his company and instead directed the defence of this key objective by unmodified Chapter serfs and gun-servitors. For this triumph he was awarded the Order of the Iron Sun by the people of the planet, which was cast in metals recovered from the battleground and can be found mounted in pride of place on the Dreadnought armour he now dwells inside.

Since leaving the life of a standard Astartes behind and being elevated to the armoured tomb of the Dreadnought, Marcena has been roused to war on numerous occasions, fighting with particular fury against the forces of Chaos. During the Thirteenth Black Crusade, Brother Marcena was honoured by the usually insular Disciples of Caliban, whom he fought alongside upon the soil of a number of planets, including Cadia itself. Their gift to him can be found in the form of the stormshield proudly attached to his left leg.

100th Post...

Well, once again, it's been a while! I'm going to keep it short and sweet this time, but as the title states, this is my 100th blogpost! Things have been rather slow lately, and I wanted to get a nice chunk of stuff finished to post up as a bit of a preview of the next couple of weeks of posts...

How's that for a nice chunk of painted goodness then? Everything was work in progress, generally at the undercoated or basecoated level before I moved here, but it's really come together in the past week or so. I've had a little time off work ill with a chest infection, so inbetween bouts of coughing I managed to get a few miniatures finished.


More detailed posts will follow, along with some newly assembled conversions, some older conversions yet to be shown but moved up in the queue, and, eventually - game reports!


Thanks to everyone that has subscribed, and sorry that things have been a little bit quiet as of late - back to our regularly scheduled blogpostings!

First 5 Space Hulk Terminators complete!

 I finally completed the first 5 Blood Angel Terminators for Mission 1: Suicide Mission.

 Sergeant Lorenzo

 Brother Zael

Brother Noctis


Rather happy with this lot - at least it's a decent chunk of the Terminators in the set complete!

Bikers continued...

The last two Astartes of the Bike Squadron...

This guy got one of the new Blood Angel heads in the renovations...

The meltagun upgrade piece from the old bike squadron boxed set - I used the plasma gunner torso in one of the armies Tactical squads.

This Marine Captain is having his shield repainted - the shield hand had come off at some point, so I decided to redo it.

Dark Eldar Pain Tokens - they're made from pieces from the Warhammer 40k basing kits - various Marine and Eldar parts. Thought they'd be rather appropriate! I picked them up off eBay for this purpose, then days later there was an article on the Games Workshop website using the exact same bits for the same purpose! Great minds...

Had some PVA going to waste after the Pain Tokens, so added the sand and gravel to these soldiers for the wasteland/Predator games. I wish Imperial Guard had something equivalent to the Aliens Smart Guns. Man-portable Heavy Stubbers, filling the role of a SAW in Guard Squads. Oh well!

Space Marine Recon Squad

Here's the first three members of my Space Marine Bike Squadron - click any of the pictures for larger versions!

The Sergeant utilising the old metal upgrade kit Sarge. I quite liked the metal upgrade parts, but for some reason whilst assembling the squad I decided the Sergeant needed a haircut...

My favourite member of the squad - that's a Khorne Beserker "bunny helmet" with the ears trimmed off - I think it makes him look rather threatening.

This squad numbers five in total (with another update with the last two members in the near future) - they were originally painted a couple of years ago, but never received any dust on their armour and bikes, any paint chipping or any static flock. I found them whilst sorting through some boxes a few weeks back and they were placed in my "to renovate" pile. Upon further inspection, the material I'd used for basing them was rather jarring when combined with the rest of the army - it had rather large pebbles, like the kind you'd find in an aquarium. 


I ended up using some blunt clippers to remove the offending material, filling any holes left over with my normal sand and gravel and generally sprucing them up before completely repainting the bases, adding flock and doing a hell of a lot of weathering to the bikes and the Marines. To say I'm pleased with the results would be an understatement! These, along with the Librarian, have spurred on a little bit more interest in painting some of my other work-in-progress Marines - the Sternguard I was working on before moving onto other projects in particular. More on those in the future.

Rebuilding the Librarium

This gentleman is my slightly-updated Librarian. This guy was one of my favourite painted miniatures (of all time) - I was super-happy with the force weapon and his skintone. This is a slight update - he kept the studded shoulderpad but got one of the gorgeous new Angelus boltguns from the Blood Angels Sanguinary Guard. It seemed to make sense that when he had a staff to keep both of his hands occupied he'd struggle to use a bolt pistol too. He also got a modified base - the skull is new (an ork one from the Scout Snipers kit) and various bits of the paintjob touched up. 

He's the start of a slight-rebuilding effort with my Marines, of which I have 5 bikes on the table at the moment. They're getting some things done to their bases (which are larger pill-shaped resin bases) which had never had flock on for some reason. When it came to just adding the flock, I decided their paintjobs could do with a bit of sprucing up too - they never really got the "extras" my Shadow Wraiths generally get - the chipped paint, markings and general muckyness - who deserves that kind of stuff more than a bunch of maverick bikers?

Currently on the Work Bench

Just started working on this bunch - some bikes from when I first got back into the hobby, a Librarian and a Captain - they all have various things to fix, various parts where they'd benefit from some detailing and they all never received flock on their bases for some unknown reason... They've been waiting patiently in the "To work on" tray since I tidied out the miniatures case months ago!

Also, I have some bitz and pieces ordered to work on some Chaos Dreadnoughts and some kitbashed Obliterators (actually specially bred mutants, "Gun-Beasts" with implant-weaponry). I'm looking for as many of the above heads as possible, or the standard Defiler sensor/heads... Can anyone out there help? Send me a message if possible!

Shadow Wraiths Master of the Forge

Introducing the only miniature I was planning on buying new for my Space Marines when I returned to the hobby...

I've always been a big fan of the latest GW Techmarine and his servitor retinue, ever since I first saw the preview pictures online. I love the segmented armour on the legs and the same sort of effect on the helmet. Just looks great! I also love the servo-harness, although it is a little busy, I think it's very fitting for a servant of the Machine Cult. Like a mobile workshop.

These are the first two Servitors for the Techmarine, done in a standard Adeptus Mechanicus style so I can use them in multiple roles depending on what I need - for the MotF/Techmarine, for a Imperial Guard-attached Enginseer, in a 40k Inquisitor's retinue or in 28mm Inquisitor and Inqmunda games.

Scavenger and what's up next...

Another miniature done...

The em4 Miniatures "Road Hero" - another "decent enough" miniature, but I thought his weaponary was lacking in detail and a bit underpowered for someone who is meant to be a "hero" in my game, so he got the silenced pistol and assault rifle.

I do rather like him, but can't help but feel that he's somewhat lacking...

Finally based up this rather random Orc character - I'm used to Warhammer Fantasy's Orcs, so the noble attire is something a bit new and interesting to me! I'm not sure how he'll be painted up, blue and yellow spring to mind or the dark green and red of my Mordheim human mercenaries...

This bunch is what I currently have on the workbench - an Ogryn for Necromunda, the Anti-Pope from Spinespur, a Techmarine and several servitors, a Scaly/Big Mutant (in the yellow - he's going to be painted Fallout 3 Big Mutant style), a Sabertooth Tiger man, some WWWII Nazi scientists and some Darkson Designs "emaciated German troopers". Quite a mixed bag!

Kantor stand-in

Just to show off my new version of Pedro Kantor, the Crimson Fist Space Marine special character, for use in my personal Marine Chapter, the Shadow Wraiths.

I saw a similar conversion online, and having the Masters of the Chapter (lovely characterful miniatures) and being in need of a Kantor, I put this together. The storm bolter has a drum magazine from a Cadian grenade launcher and his head is from the new Space Wolf plastics. I've now stripped the original miniature, but the scheme will be very similar.

Let me know what you think! I should be painting him up in the next couple of weeks - I have some nifty ideas about running him with my new Sternguard :)

I haven't been entirely lazy...

Just a very quick update to show what I've been working on over the past days since my last post...

3 Chaos Hounds - one very old (mk1), one from a plastic wolf (actually from a non-GW game, possibly licensed by them to Milton Bradley - Battle Masters) with a head from an old Chaos Hound (mk2) and resculpted slightly to fit the theme and to fill in a hole that was formerly occupied by a goblin rider and lastly, another GW Chaos Hound (mk3). 1 Space Marine Scout, of the Iron Talons Chapter - he's for use in games of 28mm Inquisitor and was also as a test for a possible small force of them. They're mentioned in Dark Creed, a Black Library book. Finally, another Sternguard. I'm also working on the next 3 and the Ezekiel-based Librarian.

Phew. More when I'm not very tired and rambling.