Our contributors have been hard at work on their hobby, getting ready for NoVA and events. Let’s see what they got done!
Jack
I started off this month continuing the Blood Angels Summer in prep for the Grand Narrative this fall, working on a couple of characters that will match up with the fantastic dawnbreaker models (though I’ve been having a lot of trouble finding more to buy….). One captain, one herald, and one apothecary will all do double duty in both 30k and 40k.
After that I got distracted by a combination of playing the battletech computer game and having a massive pile of grey plastic from the kickstarter a few years ago, and decided to hammer out a whole bunch of my collection. It’s a lot of fun – I can paint a whole lance in just a couple days, and have a lot of room to experiment with paint schemes and colors that I don’t usually use.
Next month I need to get back on my Blood Angels, there’s not a whole ton of time before the Grand Narrative and there are still a few things I want/need to get finished, including the rest of my Aeronautica force.
SRM
This has not been my month. Hot on the heels of July’s funeral trip, I spent an exhausting week and a half visiting the other half of my family, who also aren’t doing so hot. I also lost a day or two to a mass shooting down the road from my house and the resulting anxiety and angst keeping me from doing a damn thing for two days. Normal country. With NOVA prep taking up a chunk of what little remaining time I haven’t sold to my employer or spent with my wife, there hasn’t been a ton of time to paint models. I hope you’ll agree that what’s there is, at the very least, as beautiful as it is eclectic.
First up for me this month is Marais and her familiar Nibblet, my wife’s character in the D&D campaign we’ve been playing over the past year. She designed the figure using Heroforge and I painted them based on some art she had been using to represent her character. Now technically I did paint this in July, but I wanted to surprise her for our anniversary in August, and you wouldn’t make me spoil a surprise for my wife, would you? You monster?
Next, it was my absolute pleasure to paint up Hexbane’s Hunters. I reviewed them earlier this month, and you should really read my review if you want some model close ups and my thoughts on their building and painting processes. I’m thrilled to bits with how this crew came out, and if the revamped Cities of Sigmar look like this I’m gonna be in deep, deep trouble.
Lastly, I painted an updated version of my Marshal Dietrich Donnerschlag. He was my Teeth of Terra Marshal in my previously smol Black Templars and I thought he was due for an upsizing. I’ve lamented at length about edge highlighting Gravis Armor before, but when most of it is covered with a cape and it’s only one dude, it really ain’t too bad. It was fun to work in all the hazard stripes, paint some unique heraldry, and I always love a big dumb cape. This model has a nice mix of textures on it, and it only took a headswap and some backpack candles to make him look properly Templar-y. He will be leading my force at the NOVA Open Narrative this year, so by the time you’re reading this he’ll likely already have lost me half a dozen games, as any Imperial hero should.
I would go on, but I’ve been plugging away at some Iron Warriors for what feels like a third of my natural life and I’m about to get on a plane for NOVA, so that will all have to wait for September. Will I give up on said Iron Warriors because I hate painting all the gribbly Chaos Space Marine detail? Only time will tell!
Soggy
My main aim this month was to get ready for a doubles Horus Heresy Event set at the end of it. It’s been a busy month!
White Scars Support Squad. Credit – SoggyI was very happy with my Stormseer model and submitted it to ArtistsEmpire‘s weekly free paint over streams. It got picked and was completely brought to life. Check out their work, it’s awesome.
With that all done here’s the 1250 point army in a glamour shot
Toby/@badusernametag and I managed to snag best painted team! This was largely carried by his crazy ass conversions which are to be see to be believed.
Next month I have something titanic planned, so that will keep me occupied for some time…
Liam
I missed last month’s post and August was very busy for me, so there’s a lot to throw into this one! I mostly managed to stick to consistent armies, for once.
Blood Angels
Some Cataphractii Terminators, a full squad of Tactical Marines, Dominion Zephon, and a Leviathan all for my Heresy Blood Angels – also sneaking in a Chaplain, for the 40k ones.
Adeptus Custodes
One step closer to finishing my Adeptus Custodes, with a Telemon and Contemptor-Galatus as well as some more Custodian Guard (with one annoyingly missing its shield gem – a replacement has been sourced).
Adepta Sororitas
Some more Sisters of Battle – Seraphim, a Zephyrim, and Retributors.
Random other stuff
Ok so not entirely focused – an Avatar of Khaine (the bad AoS one), a Black Legion Marine, a Necron Lord, some Dark Reapers. Normal things that get painted together.
Keewa
This month I’ve been having a grand old time working on my fledgling Genestealer Cultists! I decided early on that I want my 4th generation hybrids (Neophytes) to be less like “the bald Harkonnens from the newest Dune film” and a bit more like the average working men and women they’re supposed to be. It’s probably pretty hard to blend in with the average hive resident when you and all your pals look like Varys with weird body mods on their foreheads. With that in mind I had a go at sculpting some luscious flowing hair out of green stuff, as well as a few wizened bearded faces for the more elderly and refined cultists.
With that attempted, I got down to the business of painting the Goliath Truck that will ferry these bold individuals to the battlefront, fully magnetised so it can either Grind Rocks or Haul Jocks, as the situation requires. A nice oil wash with burnt umber gives it a lovely touch of grime. The Scalecolour Fluor does a fantastic job of light OSL on the shoulder lamps and vehicle headlights, I’m very impressed with it.
… and sliding in just under the deadline comes my Aberrant Hypermorph, he’s a scary looking guy, that’s for sure. Or should that be guys…? I based him on an industrial base which I made following a tutorial from Duncan Rhodes himself, thanks Duncan!
Lenoon
This month was a crazy sprint to finish my Ultramarines Heresy list for an upcoming club event – and while I’ll use the March to Terra article from the other week as the photo dump, I am mainly here to say: all the rush and effort this month was worth it.
Fantastic day of gaming, and then – and I still can’t believe it now – won a lovely prize for Best Army, and I even won some games. All that time spent dirtying paint jobs, obliterating checks and hand drawing various transliterations of U and UL, worth it – not because of winning, but because people really enjoyed seeing my army. That’s why I paint, and why I put effort into paintjobs and backgrounds and little details – to create the fantastic spectacle that only mini wargaming can do – and I’m really happy that people enjoyed my approach to the Ultramarines.
Yes, I’m using the monthly hobby round up to brag, but I never win games and always think my painting is messy and crap, so this is a new and rare experience for me! Also, please have this dread:
Cronch
Hi, it’s my first time on the hobby roundup! August was an up and down month for me. The final weekend of the month I attended the Age of Sigmar Throne of Skulls doubles event at Warhammer World with a good friend. We had planned out a matching pair of Sylvaneth and Idoneth Deepkin armies, with me responsible for the Idoneth. At the start of the month, knowing I’d already left it late to be starting, I finally painted an Isharann Soulrender! I’m really happy with how he came out.
Ultimately, a couple of heatwaves in the UK and some up and down mental health meant I didn’t get enough time and energy invested in the Idoneth project, and so I agreed with my doubles partner that I’d pair his Sylvaneth with a Maggotkin army pulled from my existing collection to form the power team “Rottingham Forest”. Nottingham Forest is Warhammer World’s local football team, you see. It’s an excellent pun.
Having removed the mental block of the looming Idoneth, I found a bit of painting mojo again. I recently read the excellent AoS novel “Plague Garden” by Josh Reynolds, and it did a lot to get me excited about the characterisation of the Stormcast Eternals, specifically the Hallowed Knights Stormhost from the book. So far I’ve finished Gardus Steel-Soul, a unit of Annihilators, and a Knight Incantor, with plans for more!
In the end the Throne of Skulls event went really well, and I came away from it feeling excited about Maggotkin of Nurgle and working through some more of my shame pile. So I used the bank holiday in the UK to paint up Gutrot Spume (another excellent character from Plague Garden). I really enjoyed putting some extra time into the shading and details on his kraken’s tentacles, seeing as they’re really the focal point of the model.
And to wrap the month up, I painted up the Rotmire Creed fighter offered as this month’s Miniature of the Month from Games Workshop stores, as a test for adding a full unit to my Maggotkin army.
Next month I’m lucky enough to have a ticket for Golden Demon, so I’ll probably be working on my entry to that for most of September! I am normally very much an army painter, so I’m looking forward to putting my all into a different kind of challenge and producing something for display.
Rockfish
I have kinda been all over the place this month, its a complete scatter shot of random games and models, to follow on from last month here are some 30K models. (Only five of these assault cannon dudes were from this month, I was filling out a unit!)
Keeping on the topic of GW games I have also done a few 40K models, notably these chaos weirdos you might have seen recently.
After that it was on to some other companies, like I was feeling like doing some infinity models earlier in the month so I did these two.
Then I got some dangerous influences that drew me into getting some paint on my battletech backlog, starting with this random scatter shot of mechs.
I also painted my first historical! A itty bitty little 12mm Cromwell, I know models go much smaller then this but wow its small.
RichyP
Just more Heresy this month, it’s all for the most recent March to Terra and for the next instalment. I also got to actually use some models in a game for the first time in years, so that was exciting too (there’ll be some pictures of this in March to Terra pt 4). There’s more stuff on the last couple of instalments of MtT but below are the ones I painted since July’s Hobby Round-Up went out.
Anyway, without further ado here’s some more of the Legion everyone loves to hate: The Word Bearers:
HQ’s
The Herald makes a reappearance as a regular Standard Bearer accompanied by two Veteran Command Squad Sergeants.
I repainted Argel Tal to match the new colour scheme, so it’s more of a half-hobby progress:
Elites
Argel needs his Dark Brethren the Gal Verbal with him (and they count as Troops in some situations too). They’ll be joined by more once I get my hands on the plastic Possessed.
A unit of Terminators, with a Warpfire Blaster (two Vulkite Chargers glued together, top to top), which were probably a better option than the Gal Vorbak points wise, but less Word Bearer’ish
Troops
As much as I like the new Mk VI marines, I think they’re greatly improved and much more rugged looking if you throw in a load of the 40k Chaos parts. It really helps that scale wise there’s almost nothing between the Mk VI and the plastic Legionaries from 40k, and with a bit of cutting and reposing they mix brilliantly.
The best example of this are the Despoilers which are a mix of types while trying to keep a general Mk VI appearance. They’re also the first unit to get a Transport.
Rotor Cannons look really cool, but in reality they’ll probably never get taken when I have Warpfire Blasters
Quickly needed some Warpfire Blaster marines for a game on Saturday, and while I could’ve proxied the Rotor Cannons, it didn’t feel right, so these were done on Friday morning before I head out at lunch time (they were primed test models hence the older Mk III)
I know they have no rules yet, but I was also itching to paint up some Cultists in the same colour palette as the Marines:
Heavy Support
The lone Heavy Support choice is the very pretty kit, the Kratos and as lovely as she is, will probably not get used as I’m going very heavily into infantry with this force. Still I couldn’t resist building and painting it, it was also actually painted last month but I’m including it here because it’ll probably not get seen again.
Group shot minus the Warpfire Blasters and Cultists (approx 2k)
Productive August thanks to school holidays, so it’ll be the last big post for a while.
HardyRoach
Busy month, so not a whole lot of hobby stuff was on the slate.
First, Blood Bowl. About halfway through my Dwarf coach/Grombrindal proxy. I wasn’t planning to work on this, but I suddenly had more inducements than expected for my next league game, and needed to get a star player proxy ready.
Also worked on a lineman to test out the colour scheme for my Halfling team, The Pumpkin Patch Crew. They’re a group of Halfling thieves beheaded by a local lord for vegetable larceny, then raised from the dead by a Necromancer as a cost-effective Blood Bowl team. Hoping to take them to a tourney towards the end of September, if I can get them done in time.
I managed to get some time to build some Napoleonics – another unit of Hungarian infantry:
And one of Perry’s spectacular Hungarian Hussars:
Look at this dashing bastard. We all wish we could could rock a pelisse (that’s the jacket) like this.
Summer
Coming to you from a galaxy far, far away this month. My previous bottle of decal fixing solution ran out some time ago and the new bottle is delayed in shipping. I’ve been working slowly on a couple of Star Wars: Armada projects while the next bottle makes its inevitable way here. It’s all a work-in-progress on the Armada front.
I settled on a colour scheme for my Republic force. Grey and olive drab. It doesn’t get more boring than that, and I intend to weather it down even further. The oil wash was still drying in the picture and you can see areas where I’m streaking the paint on purpose to give it more directionality. I’ll used light, geometric accents to break up the weathering and grey a bit. I intend to end up with a thoroughly utilitarian colour scheme.
I’m keeping my usual black and grey look for the Onager-class Star Destroyer. Two stencilled chevrons direct the eye to the front of the ship – the business end of its superweapon. I’ve wanted to paint my Onager for a long while, but it will be heavy on the decals and I need my decal setting solution to arrive.
On the completed front, I polished off a Star Wars: Legion stormtrooper squad. I opted for a stripey cold-weather camouflage pattern. The usual greys and oil washes keep the scheme grimy and utilitarian in appearance. It’s my first attempt at painting camouflaged armour and I think it came out well.
The sergeant’s model showcases the zenithal lighting and dusty drybrush quite well.
I was especially happy with the automatic gunner. Red lenses and accents on the weapons break up an otherwise monotonous scheme.
The whole squad. Ready to deliver some Imperial order.
Skails
This month I dug into a unit of the latest deathrattle skeletons for Hyshian Soulblight Gravelords. This kit was a lot of fun to build and paint.
Perigrin
This month I had intended to either make a dent on my huge pile of heresy minis that I have left to paint, or my army for a 6th Edition Warhammer Fantasy event coming up in October, but I instead got massively distracted. First of all, I started a new campaign for my Necromunda group and needed to get my gang ready for that, and second, I’ve been being a dangerous influence and painting Battletech models. Both projects I used as an excuse to try out the new(ish) Army Painter Speedpaints after buying a set out of curiosity, and aside from some reactivation problems I really dont have many complaints. Aside from the fact that I am still locked in violent combat with the autofocus on my phone, which is currently winning the war.
Tried a few different Speedpaints on these, followed by an all over drybrush with Citadel Hexos Palesun, which is an awesome highlighting drybrush cheating paint.
For the Battletech models, it was both me trying out the new Speedpaints and me trying out drybrushing light colors over a grey undercoat, then putting those on top. I’m reasonably happy with how it came out, though there were some teething issues and some spots I am not entirely happy with.
Also this month, at the beginning of the month I finally got around to finishing something I have had for a while, that being a rubber toy version of the Robotech mech that the Warhammer Battlemech was confusingly adapted from in the 80s. Its almost the same size as the new plastic models, but its proportions are all kinds of messed up. As it is super-deformed and adorable, I decided to paint it as a Black Widow Company Warhammer, specifically Natascha Kerensky’s as the idea of that very edgy and 80s character having an adorable rubber mech was too funny not to do.
Bair
If you’ve scrolled this far, congrats! You win nothing.
After a quiet July I got busy painting this last month working on ships for Armada (not Star Wars but Kings of War by Mantic) as well as painting a little over 3k points worth of Imperial Fists for Horus Heresy which you can see more of in the March to Terra.
I still have a bit of work to do on these ships, notably adding some water effect to the bases (which arrived literally as I’m typing this but I’m being yelled at to upload my stuff so that’ll be in next month’s). This is a really fantastic game and really recommend looking into it. It’s a nice simple game with boarding actions, broadsides, and explosions – what’s not to love?
I’ve also been working on my Nords for Conquest: The Last Argument of Kings. Heroes go on the same size stand as a regiment so instead of having it just slot in and it look rather empty I made this hero base for my Jarl or Blooded, using cork and sand to build up the area. Also finished up my first regiment for the army – a unit of Huscarls. I often see these in brighter colours and blues and wanted to have an earthy feel to them instead, which I think I’ve accomplished and the little white flowers and green grass helps offset the darkness.
I also went to a small 1250 point narrative Horus Heresy one dayer where I took a Stone Gauntlet of Imperial Fists (yes, the Breacher squad is playing as a Phalanx Warder squad to be legal). Was a great time and got my ass handed to me by some Gal Vorbak and co. Word Bearers. Great day playing games and really fun to get the Kratos on the battlefield!
It does all fit together – so far at least!
I’ll work on the legs next. I know the instructions tell you to start with them but I’ve found with Titanicus that it actually helps when posing if you have the titan’s body available. That way you can tell what the whole model will look like, where its centre of gravity is and so on, when you work on the legs. Also I ordered some brass rod for the industrial-grade pinning that’s required but it hasn’t arrived yet, so that’s holding me back somewhat.
On an entirely different subject (and scale) I also finished this little M3 Stuart from Warlord, in the early war desert Caunter scheme. My club is running a little 500 point Bolt Action round-robin tournament and it has already earned a fearsome reputation, thanks to the unreasonable number of machine guns it has.
PierreTheMime
What a month it has been. With summer winding down, the family and I got in a bunch of travel (including to go slam hams with folks at GHO Maryland) so my painting output has been fairly limited.
This Scriptor Mortis has been sitting on my backlog (the front shelf of my desk, immediately below my monitor), mocking me since its release. I decided to finally put some paint to it so it could go join its friends in the display cabinet.
While I was on the subject of fiddly ghosts, I finally worked up the courage to paint up Awlrach the Drowner. This is one of those models that’s impossible to do fully assembled, so it was an adventure in figuring out the best subassembly method.
Overall, I’m pretty happy with how things turned out. The water effect doesn’t really show up well in photos, but the bottom of the boat, the oar, and a trail behind the vessel are “wet”, along with the dead/desiccated seaweed.
With this model done up, I’m pretty much at a “full” army for Nighthaunt, which is an incredible feeling. I have another 50ish Chainrasps I could do up at some point, and I should probably pick up another set of Grimghast Reapers to bulk things out, but otherwise the range is pretty well covered. This means I’m probably going to pivot to my next AoS army I intend to paint but possibly never play–Kruleboyz.
Fowler
This month has seen some serious progress on big projects, with my Maggotkin and 2 additional Mega-Gargants creeping closer to complete! More to come on those. In terms of finished stuff, I knocked out the Chaos Legionnaires for Warcry. Originally, these models didn’t really excite me – but the red brigandine and a bit of classic Chaos flair had me really happy with them. I had an enamel mishap (some ancient enamel stain was not airbrush ready) and they are a bit grimier than I intended. Between a few finished Warcry warbands, ending up with a cheap Archaon, and the recent Chaos reveals… I might build out a Slaves to Darkness force when the line gets a refresh later this year.
On the more heroic end of the spectrum, I painted up the models from the Warhammer Quest: Lost Relics. Review still to come!
But Fowler, where’s the real weird stuff? Well… hot on the heels of my giant pile of traitor guard, I am working on the next 10 guardsmen, the new cultists & Accursed, and…
some counts-as dirtcycle riders for Ash Wastes / Chaos rough riders. My focus here is to have mounted versions of gangers I already have on foot. My grand plan is for the mortal chaos dudes to be the antagonists in my next Necromunda campaign. GW… please give me an all-regular-dude Chaos army option!
Primaris Kevin
So in spite of my conspicuous absence from these updates over the last few months, I have actually been painting. Summer was spent cranking out terrain for the GHO Maryland, including a full Sector Mechanicus and Zone Mortalis table. You can also see the giant fortress gun that I printed in June and was able to get painted with the help of several volunteers.
Inspired by all the progress and fun times, I dove back into the Puppy Gang project that I’ve been working on for… way too long. Basically the idea is that my daughter comes up with the color schemes and I put it on a model. Unfortunately the combination of ADHD, life, and decision paralysis has resulted in me only having three models done, but there is now a Queen to go with the two Sisters.
My favorite part about this project is that the color scheme is incredibly vibrant and fun, and it really forces me to go outside of my comfort zone. The last time I painted skin or faces before this project was over a decade ago for Orks. I’ve never had to do makeup, let alone blue eye-shadow and mascara, but my wife agrees that the end result is suitably intimidating. My daughter has already worked out the next model, a chem-thrower. Green shoes, magenta pants, purple tabard, red top… and purple hair with red highlights and a flaming orange ponytail.
I think when I use them they’re going to be called “Reaving Rainbow”.
