Afternoon #Warhammer Community I recently shared some pics of my friend Otty's Tyranids and one of the comments from Disillusional asked 'how does he do that?' I've a few WiP pictures to share and a recipe from the man himself. It's not comprehensive because I think the paints have changed but this is his Sporocyst [or landed Tyrannocyte].
He starts with a Grey Primer, Halfords, but did you know the recipe has changed recently? I've seen a few people complain it's not as good and I can confirm the Red Oxide is now much glossier than previous cans.
Apparently the Chitin plates are basecoated Tallarn Sand.
He then paints 'scorched brown' [Rhinox Hide] lines on the chitin, to make all the patterns.
This is then followed up by Bleached Bone lines inside the darker lines and on any raised areas.
All the green is highlighted with 'goblin green' [Warboss Green] with some light yellow mixed in.
Finally, all the toxin sacs are picked out with red, Mephiston Red seems about right. Hopefully that helps, if not search for Jes Bickham's Tyranids. His Hive Fleet Eumenides was the inspiration for Otty. The Chitin may be very different but it's an alternative take on it with slightly similar results.
Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity I've been playing TENTH! #New40k again, this is a while ago, so I'm not sure how much I remember but it was a chance for a few of us to get together. This was Scott's Aeldari versus Otty's Tyranids.
Scott and Liam had quite the array, with a Wraithknight, Avatar, Wave Serpent and some Wraithguard.
Otty had some Carnifex, Tyrannofex, Zoanthropes, Hive Guard, Termagants and Genestealers/Broodlord
I think we got first turn and, as always, got as far up the board as possible.
I'm pretty sure the Tfex got a really good shot on the Wave Serpent, but thanks to a stratagem was able to shrug off half its damage, keeping it alive. With hindsight I think this was a pivotal moment. If that Wave Serpent had have gone down it might have changed everything. We did however kill the Rangers in the Tyranid Capillary Towers...
Which gave the Avatar the perfect launching point. Concentrated fire on the Tfex put it down, with the Wraithknight, Avatar and Wave Serpent taking out their biggest threat.
Scott and Liam had been able to make great progress, both in board control and damage to the Tyranids. We were already floundering. We were struggling to put any damage on those big 3.
And the Avatar stepped down from the Towers to wipe out the Zoanthropes.
I think we lost so much more after this and although I thought the game was a bit more 'fun' than previous attempts I know Otty was unimpressed. Our rolling was unspectacular, we were out-gunned and the constant rule checking didn't help the flow of the game. Not having the stats for the nids on cards I was constantly switching between the 2 Indexes giving the rules for both factions. It's not a great way to play. The actual game rules - if we played more and got the core rules down that might help but definitely having the faction rules to hand will be of benefit. I've a better report coming though with my Knights, so look out for that.
Bless me #WarHamFam for I have sinned, it's been nearly 3 months since my last confession! Not to mention it's been two months since my last blog post. However, after #DreadTober I felt like I needed to take a bit of a break.
I've not done a huge amount of hobby in that time. But I did end up going to Armies On Parade in an actual store and I have a couple of NOT battle reports to share from my weekend at Otty's. Also, my job has a bit of a blogging element to it now; so whereas doing the blog used to be something different from my day job, now it overlaps. This means that the blog isn't always the escape from what I do on a day-to-day basis that it used to be. Therefore it's much harder to be motivated and without the content what are you gonna do?
I just wanted to check back in, say I am still around and with that time off I finally became motivated to put some Skeleton Bone on my Terminators. Yes, my Deathwing are finally progressing again, just in time to be semi-redundant with new Deathwing on the way. Although, I am no fan of the tiny new Mace's of Absolution. But I've overcome the initial lake of motivation to paint them. Statistically I may only be 25% through them but the two sets of bone highlights are the hardest and most tedious aspects of the model. Everything after that is mainly detail work with limited blending, except for the green tabards. I just want them done and out of the way.
After that I've plenty of Tyranids to add washes to, I've done a fair bit of base-coating I need to share. As much as I organise my efforts with my TO DO LIST I've been quite happy to set a hobby season 'satisfied' point and I'm very much thinking the Deathwing will meet that quota. So, if any of these Tyranids get done I'll be over the moon.
For now I'm going to leave it there, I'll have a better idea of things after Christmas.
Afternoon #warmongers and #warhammercommunity it's #ArmiesOnParade and after enjoying the 2022 Parade in store at my nearest Warhammer in Liverpool, I was desperate to get in there again this year. This time I was going to parade my 4 'new' #BloodBowl teams on a scratchbuilt Megabowl 7's pitch and I've been working on it, adding to my teams all year. I managed to secure a bronze pin for completing the first quarters' challenge but the silver and gold eluded me because the tasks are set up for 40k and AoS, rather than the Best of the Rest category. And, some of these figures had been painted in previous years, just never had a chance to parade so they weren't completed within this time frame.
Anyway, it is all moot. After preparing everything, Parade Day in Liverpool coincides with Liam's 50th birthday! Now I love AoP, but I love my hobby crew even more and the promise of a weekend gaming with these guys is a much better proposition. And, thanks to COVID there are still entries online and although I have no chance of winning I'm still taking part virtually.
And that means this will be my 10th year of taking part - a decade of parade and although I would love to be there in person I've entered in absentia and online previously. I have my bronze pin for the year, so I'll take that as my participation badge. And, I can share on social media, so I'll still feel part of it at the very least.
Anyway, the Parade. As mentioned it's my 4 teams and these have all been shown before but never altogether and I went to great effort to get decent lighting - 3 daylight bulbs, a ring light and 2 other room lights, so at least the colours are decent on the Porkbelly Stuffers
Sadly the Rotspawn is just a little out of focus here, but the rest of Anaplastic PXA look pretty cool.
And my old skool 2nd edition team colours of the Middenheim Marauders.
The Orcs were loosely based [just with a lot more rust] on Robin Cruddace's 'Da Badland All Blacks' and as I still have zero ideas for my own novelty name I may as well acknowledge the inspiration and henceforth they will be Da Badland All Blacks.
I mean that's an unholy mess right there for a match start. Of course I've put a full team in each quarter, when in fact there should only be 7 players a-side for 7's but it was the rule of cool on showing off the entire team.
I'd still love to parade instore with this, but the Manchester Parade day is the day after Liverpool's and Liam's 50th is a weekend of gaming at Otty's. I may have another chance with Warhammer Wigan, if they have a parade it might be on the 25th [the day of the online winners stream]. We'll see...
Whether this gets held over to next year I don't know, unlikely as I think it might be my Tyranids [again] but this time featuring as much of the Leviathan additions as I can. Although I suspect the Leviathan category may be lost for 2024 it still feels like the best plan.
Thanks to the 3 Kurnoth Hunter Treemen and 2 star players the substitutes corner is pretty cramped. But they added to the team, which otherwise would have been just the basic squad, with no heavy hitters. Now, it's got the best line-up, though I still suspect they'd get squished.
I do fancy a Rumbelow Sheepskin to complete the team but I'm not that precious to drop £23, despite that being £2 cheaper than a plastic Techpriest Manipulus, which I also fancy for some reason.
I rotated the board round to see it from every angle.
The Nurgle team. I added the additional infected rotter, from a Poxwalker for the Parade.
I do think at some point I may buy a Lord of Plagues to convert to go with the team. It's an iconic figure, so much so I think everyone should paint one and for £12, maybe as a star player - a Bilerot Vomitflesh proxy perhaps [not a huge fan of the sculpt], it's decent value [again, see the Manipulus].
But more players for teams I don't play with seems a nonsense at this point.
I've had visions of a Karla Von Kill conversion from a Necromunda Escher gang member for years.
Haven't done it, so perhaps I can resist the temptation to adding to these teams.
But the fun is in the painting, as variety from nids and Dark Angels. Of course they're all done now so it's either dig out some of my old skool 2nd edition teams, or there's that Warhammer Underworlds Vampire warband to take forward.
Da Badland All Blacks [getting used to the name].
These were the main thing I painted for AoP2024, the whole team and two star players.
I had looked at doing a backdrop, but I no longer have access to a large printer.
Additionally, I felt it obscured other folks boards last time, little knowing that wouldn't be an issue.
I could have painted one from scratch, straight onto a piece of board, but I did not have something 2' wide.
I suppose I could have bought some more MDF, but I just didn't think it was warranted.
If I ever think to parade it in person I may go to the effort to do a single sided backdrop, but for now I'm happy with it.
Worth noting the 2 balls in the centre of the board.
And the Dwarven referee - short-sighted and deaf - the best ref!
That's mostly it, just 4 three-quarter diagonal shots to get a feel for the board, enjoy!
And, because I can, I'm gong to give myself a Bloody Great Big Bloody Stamp of Bloody Approval!
