Adeptus Titanicus - Battlefield assets, terminal pins and markers - TO DONE! 🔴⚪

Afternoon #Warhammer Community I've been #PaintingWarhammer on my Adeptus Titanicus - Battlefield assets, terminal pins and markers.

We've actually been playing with unpainted ones - now THAT is heresy! But as I'd foisted my Red Planet BASE!🔴 on Otty and his shed, then the next thing to do was paint my assets accordingly.

Alongside my own penchant for Blessed Verdigris 🗽

Void Shield Generator. I had no plan for glow effect. When I ended up with a 'radar' spin I realised one of the arms was going in the wrong direction... I ummed and aahed for all of 5 minutes before I was compelled to fix it.

Plasma Generator follows suit on my red glass insulator coils, rather than blue or even orange plasma glow FX.

Comms Radar Dish.

Command Bunker.

Missile Defence Battery.

Lost titan crew.

Titan firing templates, all shiny and gold. 

So much better using painted versions of these.

And fun to play around with gold. 4 new things painted.

OK, so here is where things get a bit tricky. Some numbered counters and triangular [or should that be hexagonal?] data pins. When I'm counting up 'models painted' should this be 11 or 2? 

Similarly, there are 42 pins here. How would you count them? Individually it seems like I'm gaming a system I have long tried to avoid for these very reasons. However, they are very fiddly to paint, even if small, so what counts when I come to my end of season review?

And another Great Big Wooden Stamp of Approval.

Here are the pics on a white background.

If you didn't already know, I love 😍 Blessed Verdigris 🗽

I'm so lazy when it comes to cleaning up models, you can still see lots of bits of sprue I should have trimmed off.

I think they all look so cool in close-up detail.

I had considered full on verdigris buttresses but thought red all the way. Maybe I'll get to play with some more and be adventurous next time...

My fallen titan head. I'll have to do a Warlord to go with it now. The Red Planet BASE!🔴 is a bit ropey here, which is a bit disappointing, but less obvious when on the mat or board.

The varnish is a bit more noticeable here, it seems to have clumped in some of the recesses. But it's a cheaper, thicker varnish so somewhat expected. 

We've got loads more of these but they're not on sprue, which will make them 10 times harder to paint, and even prime. Maybe they are worth 'one completed model' each! What do you think?

More TO DONE's to follow.

A freebie - Wound Markers MK-IV - 8th Edition compliant

It would appear that keeping track of wounds is going to be a meaty task in 8th Edition with the likes of Imperial Knights having more than 20 and the large Tyranids a dozen or more. As much as everyone seems to think that's still feasible with dice, who really wants a D20 sat next to their model? I mean at least with D6s in 7th you could purchase some unobtrusive little ones [not that anyone did], D20s are big beggars and it'll just look downright odd.

Of course I immediately saw that my own markers were slightly lacking, insomuch as although they went up to 10 [thank you Doom of Malan'tai, we still miss you], they needed a few more to meet the bounty of wounds set to be given up to our big vehicles and monsters. I'd also seen plenty of folk clamouring for a solution so I thought I better step up and fix that uncertainty so we can think about the rest of the sky that's falling - like GW making massive new marines, 'cos it's not like the community hasn't been crying out for true-scale, how dare they give us what we wanted?!

Anyway, I added in new markers up to 30, or actually it'll be counting down now, which I'll have to get used to, excuse me while I write some long-winded scathing rant to GW about how the fact I'm now forced to count wounds down and how it's ruined my life! I digress. 

I've also done them in a variety of colours, either to match your faction, or to have a range to choose from to attach to different models so they don't get mixed up. So I've got:

• Red - original and best - ideal for Khorne and Blood Angels
• Pale Blue - Tzeentch
• Yellow - Imperial Fists?
• Green - Nurgle, Necrons or Salamanders
• Pink - Slaanesh or Emperor's Children
• Brown - Nurgle, Astra Militarum
• Yellow and red - More Imperial Fists?
• Black and Red - Khorne, Black Templars, Ravenwing, Raven Guard

 

Usual step-by-step to make:

1. Print
2. Apply double sided tape to back
3. Stick to mounting card
4. Carefully apply sellotape to top if you want them pseudo-laminated
5. Cut out with craft knife/scalpel
6. Amaze your friends and enemies with these counters
7. Tell them to visit www.40kaddict.uk for their own free markers.
   
   So if you want them you can download the .pdf here:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B97Rk-BalgZbNEJwNnpIV3FyaGc

Choose what suits you best. Obviously when 8th hits these may end up being impractical, goodness knows how to store them all so it'll be easy to find the specific number you need. It may well be that laminated datasheets with dry wipe pens used on wound trackers will be the most practical way to keep account of how damaged someone is. But that's still not as easy for your opponent to see how wounded a model is as a marker, yes even a dice, right next to that model. 

I know some have suggested rotating wheels, similar to the old Titan void shields or the discs for X-Wing but they seem too big. Alternatively there are these handy knitting/crochet counters that folk are raving about. Potentially they could be a good idea, again for me it reall depends on size.

Then there's the other option I once saw of putting small elastic bands on the model but again that suffers from 'counting down' issue I'd always railed against and therfore counted up. If we're to count down remaining wounds, as you will HAVE to do in 8th, your Imperial Knight is going to have to begin the game with twenty odd elastic 'looms' festooning it's Adamantium hide like its at Spring Break before the game even starts!

Markers

You probably already know this - I'm a big fan of markers to help keep track of what's going on, in fact I need to start making some for my Dark Angels and various Psychic powers for my Librarian. I believe so strongly enough in the benefit to the game I give my markers away FREE and together with my Patented method of constructing the markers:

1. Print
2. Apply double sided tape to back
3. Stick to mounting card [I use black card which is black all the way through, alternatively a black Sharpie or other marker will make the edges really cool looking]
4. Carefully apply sellotape to top if you want them pseudo-laminated
5. Cut out with craft knife/scalpel
6. Amaze your friends and enemies with these awesome markers
7. Tell them to visit www.40kaddict.uk for their own free markers.

everyone can look cool, unlike those 'wound dice' users who are definitely uncool [Ben]! That said I know some folk like a more premium product, want something more durable and are happy to pay for it and I stumbled across these two in my regular 40k surfing. This has been a 'draft' post for a long time so I thought I'd just share them in case folk didn't want my own Freebies or even the awesome free ones at From the Warp, Realm of War or even Graven Games

www.bcmarkers.com produce these nifty markers, obviously made from unfurled bottle caps 'bc' get it? They're printed and attached to the cap with a domed clear plastic cover to protect them and add the 'premium' finish you may be after. I have to say the graphics look particularly detailed, there definitely looks like a lot of effort and skill has gone into these.

Alternatively http://battlemarkers.com use a different process - badges [or buttons I think they called in the US] these are made without the pin in the back. They look really durable and a very high finish, the graphics are also top notch and they're quite well priced too.

 

Both options look pretty good to me, if you're in the market for these sorts of things, their only problem is they're both roughly 1" in diameter. Wound counters are going to be a bit bulky at this size on the battlefield, psychic powers about right. It does mean your less likely to lose them as they're much bigger than my tiny ones but if you have that concern you shouldn't be paying for something that could be considered disposable anyway.

Right, that's got me down to 20 draft posts remaining...

MOAR Vortex Templates

Despite the arm pain I actually managed to do some bits. In fact because I took the day off to see the doctor I had some free time and in a moment of madness I just decided to knock out a couple more Vortex templates. Having enjoyed the fun of them in my last game I'm hoping for a number of doubles in future games and I though three would be sufficent. I originally completed the first one in July last year and had put aside a couple of the Christmas baubles the other day.

Sadly I didn't take any pictures this time but I did adapt how I made them, without considering the original tutorial:

• I used masking tape to attach a tissue round the outside to avoid overspray
• I bunched the tissue up and this formed a support to hold the bauble in a plastic cup
• when I did the colour spray I rolled up some card into a U shape so it would fit inside the bauble - when I sprayed I could get more defined lines and edges inside the bauble while masking off other areas

Having not referred to the original bauble first  I also noted:

• my spots were more uniform, bigger and more of them
• I also switched in a green spray for a bit of variety
• didn't really do any streaks
• could have done to do:
•  less spots, 
• a spray of colour,
• then some more white spots for added depth,
• a light spray of black, 
• more spots,
• final coat of black

 I'm really pleased with the two extra templates, the uniformity is a minor irritation but for a 20 minute job I was really chuffed. Should I need any more I know I can get them done in a jiffy :)

Dark Angel Objective markers

I made another decision. Despite being perfectly happy with my force field pylon objective markers I decided to do the force field glow effect on the generators. I planned to add glow effects on the Knight so it made sense to recreate the effect I did for my Plasma weaponry to see how it would look. I know that sounds odd as my Plasma guys clearly illustrate how, but I needed more reassurance.

I wasn't 100% convinced this time around. I'm not sure it looks like a glow and more like yellow discs.

With that doubt in mind I added a little more orange inside the creases of the discs.

I think this is more what I was after, it's less defined as an object but I think more realistc as a source of lighting.

I also applied the same effect to the plasma coils in the Teleport homers. Obviously I did them completely differntly to how I did Plasma coils on my weponry but nevermind.

I'm less convinced of the beacon lights but I'm hoping Tamiya Clear Red X-27 may lift them up. The OSL works, it's just the lights themselves that look a bit flat.

Nearly there though and then I can tick them off. Still no idea how to number them, there realy isn't space to put a numeral and even then it'd look slapped on after adding the SFX now :(

The question is do I go with the yellow/orange glow as above [when there's already yellow on the chevrons so it may look confusing] or, do I go with the green glow I did on my Epic Reaver titan?

What do you think? I'm not even sure if this was the final iteration of the orange plasma, maybe that's it, less yellow/white moar orange.

Make your own Vortex template

I've not really had a need for a Vortex template before, but then the Ravenwing Dark Talon's Rift Cannon was upgraded to give the potential to create one so I suddenly had the urge to get one. Of course they're quite difficult to get hold of and on ebay they're going for about £15! So I wondered about alternative options. I still recall Ron From the Warp's awesome 'Wiffle ball' tutorial but funnily enough it was Rob's tutorial from warhammer 39999 that I remember most. But Wiffle balls don't seem to be easily available in the UK so I got to thinking about other 3" diameter objects

And I already had them! A while back I helped my son make a Neon atom for his physics class and the centre-piece containing the electrons, protons, neutrons [delete as appropriate science folk, I think the electrons are aound the outside?] was a clear plastic Christmas bauble. now I only needed one but my local art/craft store had a pack of 10 and they're just 4mm wider than a standard small blast so I thought I'd have a crack at making my own, so first up I cut off the hanging tab.

Now the difference with these is you can spray them on the inside to retain a super high gloss finish. So I covered my hands in a plastic bag and sprayed above the bauble with white, trying to ensure spots of paints dropped onto the bauble y'know for that spacy look.

And it came out alright, but while I was taking the pictures I missed the opportunity to drag some of the bigger spots with a cocktail stick for some weird warp lightning.

And therefore I sprayed some on some cardboard and tried to paint it on, with limited success and actually picked up some of the Red Oxide undercoat when the solvents managed to melt the primer on the spray box I was using. Still it was a first draft so I didn't mind so much.

I then did the same with the Red Oxide primer to add some nice colour tints to it, like gaseous nebulas and then it was a coat of black spray primer.

And I ended up with this! OK, it's not perfect but Ron took 12 attempts to get happy with his and Rob did three. As I only had the one coloured spray can and paused to take pictures inbetween I was a bit limited but for practically zero cost I'm chuffed with the results especially the high gloss finish, which is the advantage of spraying inside the bauble. Of course you can paint the outside too if you want a matt finish but that'll require a varnish to protect your handiwork.

I did actually put an LED candle inside to see if it would add an unearthly glow in the warp but it was a bit pants, and even worse in the dark as it shone through all the black spray like it wasn't even there!

Anyway, for a 5-10 minute job I'm pretty pleased with the results, so thought I'd share an alternative way to make the Vortex templates