'nids part 104 - To done! Plasma Hatchers Mycetic Spores

These Plasma Hatchers scratchbuilt Mycetic Spores finally got their Tamiya Clear Red X-27, I think I may be reverting to my teenage persona and just putting as much gore on as possible. So juvenile!

I really love the way the 'brainy' bits have come out though, they really look like exposed flesh.

And the tentacles too look positively icky thanks to the gloss varnish, must get some more.

Damn that mould line on the the top. You try really hard to get rid of them all and they still show up, nevermind these are only spares.

Yep that's some raw fleshy bits on top.

I think you could get definitely get away with these being Vengeance Weapons Batteries.

The slightly dull side view where I added some extra texture with my rough bone stripes.

And yet more pics, they deserve it, this has been a project over 12-18 months since I bought them.

I wish I'd picked up more of the beggars now, they're actually hard to get hold of and even then not the £2.99 I paid, more like a tenner! May as well look at the GW model IF it ever arrives, although on principle I may wish to abstain.

Anyway, job done!

Mycetic Spore V2.0 Plasma Hatcher | part 1. | part 2. | part 3. |

'nids part 103 - Magnetised Hive Tyrant part 3

Back to my second pair of Flyrant wings. I've added some veins again. I find a cocktails stick is handy for this as you can roll the stick to get areas of thick and fine paint, much as you do veins.

I'll be adding some lighter highlights at the junctions and then be overpainting them with more red highlights to give the impression the veins are 'sub-dermal'.

It's amazing how similar these look to my original wings, although the pictures are a little misleading. Due to the red oxide primer base these wings are a lot darker than the original wings. I'll do a straight up comparison at a later date.

At least I don't have the crusty deposit of Seraphim Sepi as you can see in these old pics of the originals. However you can see that by starting with a Bonewhite base and then adding thinned Mechrite red and both sepia and mud washes I was able to get many tints in the wings making it quite 'membranous' something that was my intention but slightly lost on the new ones, they look practically rigid but they do match the old Forgeworld Shrike Wings, form what I've seen, so that's not too bad.

And the Devourers have had a nice wash too. Lets hope those playtest rumours don't hold true for the Hive Tyrant and they can no longer take them. It would be a real kick in the balls for all those who've made them only to no longer get the de-facto Flyrant build.

The Big question is what colour do I do the blades for the Swarmlord?

As you can see my Boneswords currently have a glossy crystalline look that uses black and turquoise.

However, this is the Swarmlord so would an alternative colour work? Particularly as his Bonesabres are so unique.

So wthat colour should I do them

1. Black with turquoise
2. Black with green
3. Black with red

I know I can do some really nice effects with the green and red but the green may be 'yet another colour' and the red may be lost in the base but what do you think?



'nids part 102 - Kitbashed Tyranid Warrior to Tyrant Guard part 1

This is another of those embryonic ideas that just sits in box/tub for months [read: years] until you can bring yourself to move it forwards. You may recall April last year I won a couple of bits auctions. With those bits I was able to round out my objectives to a decent number, certainly enough to meet the needs of 6th Edition - Prescience there I think [and that was before we knew what Prescience was]! Additionally I made my Warrior to Hive Guard conversions, some more Termagants, a new Warrior with Deathspitter and enough Genestealers to start my Ymgarls. Essentially these paid for themselves many times over and I've still got bits to use and a couple of 'foundations' for a complete kitbash - this is one of them - Warrior to Tyrant Guard.

This has always been challenging as the bits will not fit on a standard 40mm base. I trimmed the tail off in the same way I did the Hive Guard and with all those Crushing Claw arms left that were spare after making the crests for the Hive Guard they were ideal for the bulky fore-limbs for the Tyrant Guard

The final pose is very much like the 'gatekeeper' and 'keymaster' hounds from Ghostbusters.

Next up was to bulk them out a bit, try and make them more armored. I achieved this with the use of the two spare chest pieces from the Trygon/Mawloc kit. Luckily I'd used the Adrenal Gland chest plate on my Trygon so the two spare ones are plain and slightly spiky. A quick trim with the scalpel and the spikes were gone and each were shortened to fit over the arms.

Now the really big issue is the 'really big issue' With the size of those feet the Tyrant Guard doesn't fit on a 40mm base. I do have 50mm bases, which he's on in these pictures but the real problem is that if I add Lash Whips so that he can bring down the Initiative of their opponents he's suddenly got a bigger base to get into B2B contact. The alternative is a 40mm base with a big piece of slate but so far his feet don't sit flat on it. The other option is to just go Scything Talons, which I have lots spare and wouldn't require any modelling skills.

This is the side where the spikes were trimmed off the Trygon plate on the shoulder.

Not sure where to go next on this. I've trimmed down a Warriors head which should work, taking the crest bits of the back of the head but something needs to be done to the shoulders to make it work right. I'll probably take another 6 month breather on this so, like this time, when I return to it I will have new ideas from a fresh perspective.

WAAAGH TIME at the Scythe and Teacup

The Scythe and Teacup is a gamers cafe in Liverpool. Mark, my local gaming club car share buddy from round the corner works there and has put on regular tournaments for 40k. Up until now I haven't been able to fit it into family life, they finish late on Sundays and usually that's family time. Anyway PeteB was going and at £7.50 for three 1850pt games in 2hrs 45mins I thought - why not? To round it out I also took the nipper who played with PeteB's nipper all day - not bad considering it was 10am to 11pm nearly.

Anyway the tournament was 18 people and it was not random pairings but you went up against folk who had been as successful as yourself. Thanks to some success I managed to achieve second place overal and came away with this rustic but still dinky trophy.

But also £20 in store credit! Wow, real world winnings! At this rate I think I'm going to need to add an awards section to the blog ;) Anyway, I may use this to pay for the next tournament in October, or perhaps hold out until November and if the new Tyranid Codex comes out then this could cover the lions [or chould that be Lictors] share of the cost.

Not only that there was a painting competition, however the rules were that only Infantry from your list could be entered. So I took my Ymgarls in my list, mainly for that reason but also so I could have yet another thing come from reserve alongside the Doom, Devgaunts in a pod, Mawloc, a second deep striking Flyrant and with my Warlord Flyrant having Hive Commander an outflanking Tervigon! Beta strike shenanigans!

Anyway, there was a bit of a mix up when it came to the time to enter my Ymgarls and I was told it was not Infantry but troops, so instead I handed in my 10 'adrenal' gaunts.

It was a 3 vote system where your 1st, 2nd and 3rd choice got 3, 2 and 1 votes respectively and I managed to win best painted figures too! There was a nice Dark Eldar unit and some very clean Wraithguard so I was quite surprised to win. The prize was my choice of 8 paints from their 'Miniature Paints' range by Gamecraft, which looks to be a local hobby company. PeteB said they're not bad paints, if a bit glossy so I picked my 8:

1. Black [you can never have enough]
2. White [you can never have enough]
3. Black primer [why not, it could be handy]
4. Aquamarine [not to far from my turquoise, and that's not goign to last forever]
5. Light turquoise [not too far from my light turquoise, ditto]
6. Coffee [just took my fancy]
7. Gloss varnish [you can never have enough]
8. Matt varnish [you can never have enough]

Anyway, battle reports to follow.

MOAR from my mate Liam - Nurgle Heldrake / Helfly, Fly 2 and Land Raider

Liam sent me more pics of his Nurgle Heldrake - the Helfly as he's calling it. This is the first one all painted up, as seen in our little Throne of Skulls mini-tournament

A thing of unnatural beauty.

And here's the Helfly 2, 'Like father, like son'. Slightly different this one but no less worrying as it buzzes the battlefield. I'm hoping that my Dark Angels might be able to employ a Spotlight which would force it to repeatedly headbutt whatever vehicle it's mounted on until it's knocked senseless - that should be a new rules errata!

Here's the step-by-step process for those interested.

You can begin to see the components and where Liam has kitbashed bits and scratchbuilt others.

Plasticard edging and 'greystuff' sculpting for added 'chaos'.

That's a big ammo-feed belt.

Undercoats ready to be painted as it's daddy.

Side view.

Lastly here's the Nurgle Land Raider, the current kit remodeleld to look like a Proteus, I think Liam sculpted and cast his own tracks for this.

Adding Nurgelesque fleshy growth and fibres here and there to tie it in with the Obliterators.

Lets hope that Spotlight doesn't attract the Helfies, could be an interesting 'own goal' if GW were to follow up my rules errata.

And the other side.

No doubt Liam or one of my other buds will have some more of their efforts to share in the futures but any questions, comments or praise just leave them below.

To Do List 2013/14

Another year and another broken list of promises ;) I've completed/nearly completed around 8 of my 20 items from 2012/13 but I've made serious in-roads into the Bloodbowl Elves, AoBR Tactical Squad and Dreadnought and prepared the 6th Edition stuff. But amongst all of that I did this:

• Winged Hive Tyrant, built and painted
• Magnetised and in progress my original Hive Tyrant to be 2nd Flyrant or Swarmlord
• Inquisitorial Vault template started and in-progress
• Armies on Parade board
• Sculpted a second set of Tyranid Defence lines that need to be finished off
• Continued to add more gaming aids/markers
• Lord of the Rings Moria Goblins - built and painted
• Oh, and made a Tyranid Bastion...

All alongside keeping the blog going, and continuing to game one way or another. These additional 8 tasks can make up for the 'failures' and are a perfect lesson for 'going with the flow'. The 'To Do List' is a guide a focus for when the hobby deserts us, like when I was awaiting the Dark Angel Codex [so no point painting them] I cracked on with the Bloodbowl teams. I ran short of completing the Elves but they'll be waiting for next time. More importantly those achievements above were all items that I was motivated to get done and that fuels the hobby. There's no point forcing yourself to do a task if your hearts not in it, you'll just baulk at it and where's the fun in that. Of course there are times to push on through the hobby funk but not if there's an easier/alternative option.

So what have we for 2013/14. No great promises this time, just the missing elements as standby

1. Bloodbowl Elves
2. AoBR Tactical Squad
3. AoBR Dreadnought
4. Dark Angel Drop Pod
5. Ravenwing bike squad
6. STC Vent tower
7. STC Athena plateau
8. Create Epic building templates
9. 60mm Dreadnought crater
10. Complete pot pourri vegetation [and blog posts for that matter!]

 But with these new ones added/expanded

1. Dark Angel - Devastators
2. Dark Angel - Dark Vengeance Tactical Squad
3. Dark Angel - Chaplain
4. Dark Angel - Librarian
5. Dark Angel - Azrael
6. Tyranid Defence Line
7. Tyranid Capillary Towers
8. Dark Vengeance Chaos Cultists
9. STC Inquisitorial Vault
10. 'Hobby Matrix' blogpost

That should keep me busy, with the 10 new items being the priorities. I need the Dark Angels at a fighting force so I can have an alternative. The 'nids are becoming a bit repetitive in games at the moment so I need variety. Admittedly I'm spicing things up with some new lists thanks to the Tyrant, Bastion and Spore Pods but that will only go so far. That is of course until the new Codex arrives, supposedly in November, when my attitude/focus/task list could change dramatically!

Blog wise I need to update my Battle Reports page. I feel forced into doing less of them, they take a long time and stop me doing painting and modelling. I'm loathe to cut them down as I like having records, particularly when cool things happen and not that I keep score but it would be nice to know my win/loss ratio should I feel inclined to throw away my principles ;) So, the least I can do is make sure my Battle Report page is current, as I think it's predominantly 5th edition battles!

If there's anything you the faithful few would like to see more of, let me know in the comments and I'll try and accommodate that too.