Star Wars Legion Geonosians - Shading, highlights and magenta

Afternoon and with the basecoats done I'm adding in the purple shading on the faces, hands and feet.

Although the black rims on the bases are slightly helpful in keeping the models in order for pictures it does make me want to paint them all. But I only did them to use up black paint on my palette and they look so good with it. Am I converting to black rims?

With the shading done I painted the white highlights for the lips, nose, eyes, knuckles, toes and fingertips. I also heavily drybrushed the wings to make them much lighter than the bodies.

Having not used Nihilakh Oxide for the wings the basecoat had been just a smidge darker than the test model but after the drybrush it was almost impossible to tell. Despite the simplicity of the scheme and eagerness to get them done I did have a couple of nights where I couldn't bring myself to paint.

Sometimes, despite the mojo and making things eminently achievable you just don't 'wanna'. And that is OK!

Because eventually you do. You get motivated and another stage is done and you feel so close to the end it's like it's all downhill from here. The momentum kicks in and it's freewheeling all the way to the bottom.

The fluoro magenta did its job but I think by batching them I'd been a little less subtle with my previous white highlights and I think there is much greater contrast and less blending between the purple and the pink.

As a group it's not much of an issue - you're only going to see the high contrast from a distance anyway. But when I compare it to the test model I can see a reduction in quality, perhaps 10% [I've always had a weird way of trying accurately quantify conceptual variations that do not lend themselves to numerical measurement]. But yeah, 10-15% reduction in quality that I can see. But no one else would so that is OK. Again, being comfortable with [nearly] finished not perfect is a great way to get stuff done. I may still get crippled by indecision sometimes. But it's definitely worth celebrating those times I can beat the voices in my head saying it's not quite good enough. 

 

Star Wars Legion Geonosians - Test model and basecoats

Afternoon, when last we left the Geonosians I was deciding on colours:

• yellow contrast, blending into red for the hands, feet and faces
• horror show - pale sking akin to my Goblin Town, but with a lot more Tamiya clear Red X-27 blood effects on the hands feet and face
• Contrast Aethermatic Blue, Stormfiend and purple washes on the hands feet and face, with the wings in Nihilakh Oxide

And as you can see I went with the last option - Aethermatic Blue

With Nihilakh Oxide on the wings, but the difference is so minimal I may just go fully Aethermatic on the whole model. Now prepare yourself for a big jump...

Yep, this is the finished model and unusually it's a test model. I don't normally do this but I just kept on going with adding the Stormfiend and the purple wash on hands, feet and face and then something wasn't right. The features were just indecipherable within the face and hands. So I decided to use my Vallejo fluoro magenta. I created white highlighted areas on the lips 'nose', and knuckles of the hands and feet. Then I added the magenta which blended well thanks to its inherent transparency. The eyes were yellow and I used rust effect paint on the gun, but a green glow emanating from inside. So I've ended up with some sort of synthwave palette, which I think is very cool.

The armour plates were just my usual black highlights. The wings got heavily drybrushed in white to be much brighter than the rest of the body. You may also notice that the base has a black rim. And I will admit it looks awesome. I had added a bit of purple wash into my usual Red Planet BASE! 🔴 scheme [as there were no bone chips]. So, the added contrast works really well with a black edge and all the other models in this force are on black rims so it seemed unnecessary to force my red rims into this space.

With the test model done and some ideas on how to make the process more efficient I basecoated the lot of them - Aethermatic blue for their bodies. Black for the armour and Vallejo Game Effects Dry Rust for the weapons.

If I had any paint left over, like the black I used it up on the rims. As the test model was done in a night I figured each step would be one night's work so I thought they'd be done in a week or less.

Although I had felt shanghaied with these inserted into my schedule I was actually enjoying the process. The test model convinced me these would look cool, despite looking nothing like the film Geonosians. So I would have 14 very cool models delivered quickly. Good hobby points, fun to do and great results. So not a bad deal afterall.

Star Wars Legion - Geonosians - Big Build & BASE - TO DONE!

Afternoon and Liam, and the rest of the gaming crew felt I should be repping some Geonosians for Star Wars Legion. Despite making it clear I want a Jawa [or at the least Sand People] force but will only consider that when they have their own rules and cards. Still he was able to print some of these for me and force their completion on my TO DO LIST.

However, they did indeed sit untouched for a good few weeks as I could not decide how I wanted to paint them. My initial thought was yellow contrast, blending into red for the hands, feet and faces. Then I considered a horror show - akin to my Goblin Town, but with a lot more Tamiya clear Red X-27 blood effects on the hands feet and face. 

But then I thought I could use the Contrast Aethermatic Blue, Stormfiend and purple washes to make some blue skinned aliens, with the wings in Nihilakh Oxide... 

Regardless, I primed them Red Oxide, then did the models white - that Primer is awful.

Whichever route I was going down this was the starting point. So the bases got Red Planet BASE! 🔴

And I got my Great Big Chrome 'BIG BUILD' BASE Stamp of Approval.

Battle record - Star Wars Legion - 18/01/26

Afternoon and once again we're back at Otty's shed playing Star Wars Legion, Wookies and Clones V's Droids. Thursday night's session had been postponed until Sunday due to work commitments. I didn't take too many pictures of the board but once again my dice were on fire! 🎲🔥

So much so it was pretty much the talking point for the night. When you're rolling is so good folk want to stop playing at 9:20pm it's not ideal. But it's not like I can help it. Or, that Liam also had some pretty good rolling.

His red defence dice were keeping a lot of his B2 Droids. I might manage 6 hits, but he rarely lost more than one of them in a turn. 

So, despite finally getting to grips with the game we're going to take a break. We've got a refresher game of MESBG next week, so I can remember how to play my Goblin Town for the Midweek MESBG in early February.

Then I have a week off, but the next time we'll all play together it should be a big game of Adeptus Titanicus. Finally getting to use the Warlords and maybe Otty will have his Eldar on the board?

Battle record - Star Wars Legion - 08/01/26

Afternoon and we're back at Otty's shed playing Star Wars Legion, Wookies and Clones V's Droids. As is the case with battle records my recollection is sketchy, but one thing was unforgettable - my dice were on fire! 🎲🔥

In lots of our games the topic of complaint is usually OP units, rules or the system itself. But this time it was just how often I was rolling good results on white dice [notoriously the hardest dice to roll well on].

It was not just the shooting, which is a D8, but the saving throws on D6s. There was a lot of shade being thrown at my success.

We're still finding a lot of issues with the rules and how they're written. I think there have been some FAQ's to help explain some of them, but much like 40k's shifting ruleset this is quite frustrating.

That's why I think the dice rolling appeals to me so much, regardless of the rules built around them it's what lands face-up that counts.

Not to mention the snacks and the great company. I mean the first part of the evening was Ben and Otty finishing off a previous game before we set up this one. I didn't mind as the shed is full of amazing figures.

Even just staring into the cabinets with the background noise of an Empire striking back, is balm to a hobby soul.

Unfortunately the paramedics among us are on night shifts next week, so Thursday is out. Maybe we'll get a postponed Sunday session.

Until then "game on!"

Battle record - Star Wars Legion - 30/12/25

Afternoon and we're back at Otty's shed playing Star Wars Legion, Rebels V's Droids for an all day 'twixmas' gaming session. I know from the date it was a Tuesday, but this liminal period between Christmas and New Year it could well have been any day.

Once again we fight, but Ben discovered we'd been setting the game up wrong, thinking it was more like a 40k set-up. In fact Legion means most units start off the board, with only those with the Scout or Prepared Positions special rule starting on the board.

With limited movement and fixed game lengths this felt like a downgrade, but in fact it means the first turn starts with just a few units on the board, so it focuses on what you can and can't do with the few models in play.

It also means that going deep into no-man's-land with rolling Droidekas is one way of getting them prioritised by Fluttercraft.

I think we ended up with a faction rules imbalance similar to when we played Adeptus Titanicus and I had Legio Gryphonicus bonuses and Liam did not. The rebels were from a specified Wookie faction, which gave us bonuses. Liam and Otty's Droids had no such buffs, which ultimately shifted the balance in our favour.

Otty's hospitality lunch was worth celebrating - nom, nom, nom!

My dice rolling was back on fire again, which meant the Droids began to have a really bad day.

But the game felt a bit more different thanks to the correct setup rules. I'm sure we played that way originally, we just somehow forgot.

We were finished by about 3:30pm which meant we could call it an early day. This was the last game we played in the shed of 2025. Of which I've been party to 37 this year! I know Ben and Liam have missed a few, but have been other times, in addition to the Thursday night sessions. I've not always been available either. But that's such a good record and it's been such a pleasure to spend time with these guys.

Genuinely the highlight of my week and I look forward to it and can't wait for 2026's round of gaming goodness!

Battle record - Star Wars Legion - 21/12/25

Afternoon and we're back at Otty's shed to finish off playing Star Wars Legion, Rebels V's Imperial and we're finishing off the last game. Usually we meet on a Thursday night, but we all had commitments so we switched to Sunday instead.

Lets just say that resetting the game and changing partners helped Liam immensely while poor Otty was not as lucky. Not that I was a jinx, I had both awesome and shocking dice rolls. But I was decidedly less concerned about the outcome while the constant reduction in Rebel units while only managing to kill 12 Stormtroopers was a source of misery for our genial host.

What made it worse, was that Ben and Liam kept on asking use to choose their unit counters the circular stack on the bunker] and in one particular situation there was a one in eight chance of choosing Moff Gideon in combat with Chewie and inevitably I chose Moff Gideon

That was the absolute highlight of the evening for me, I was in hysterics.

We had a late surge to score some points, I think we scored 7, but Ben and Liam racked up 17 by the end of the game.

It's a tough one, but we had been saying up until this point the game was stacked in the Rebels favour. At least we finally got to buck that trend.

We may get a game in between Christmas and New Year but it's been a special full year of fun for the hobby shed.