Double Trouble

I had an absolute blast at Double Trouble on Saturday. First up I won the raffle, I'm only starting with that as it means it's my blog roll picture. Look what I won! There was a moment where I was actually embarrassed but it was such a cool prize I had to accept. What I do with it will depend on whether Genecult comes out as a Codex or not.

Moving on to the actual event I got paired with some really great people including Rob Hill from 30kplus40kequalsinfinity and From the Fang event organiser Alex for the last game. But I also got to play against Luke Fogg from Darksun Life and meet a couple of other bloggers including Mike from St Andrews Wargaming and folk I've met before, like Ian and my own Battle Brother Dan, who went on to win the award for most Blood Points!

Dan and I from Battle Brothers 2013

The German guys were back again too and I got to play against Hendrik's brother Kai-Uwe. But all the partners and opponents were total gents and hopefully I'll be seeing them again in future. The games were good, but actually the interaction between all four players was the highlight and I think I'll really struggle to do the battle reports, partly because half the time I might not know what my partner was doing but because the people were more entertaining than the little guys we were pushing around.

All that said the venue screwed up, they'd double booked us with a Warmachine weekend 24 hour tournament. So we were in a downstairs room usually used for drama classes. It was dark and the terrain was even more sparse than in the past. The food was delayed too, but the Panini was really good when I got one. Personally those two issues were easily overlooked for me, but Alex was not impressed which may just jeopardise coming back again to the NWGC, which is sad considering it's just had a refit. I'd hoped to be able to report back to my mates how much it had been improved but sadly just the Warmachine players got to benefit, although a weekend of 24 hour tournament, no wonder they got preferrential treatment!

So Alex is potentially looking at another store in Sheffield, which will be where the November event will be held. Which is fair enough, it's more local for him but I'm sure he'll fill us all in as plans get made. The only real disappointment for me was I didn't take any pictures, alright 'selfies' with my partners/opponents. It's the one thing I wanted to do to capture the spirit of the event but just couldn't bring myself to do it, maybe next time. If I was scoring this it'd definitely be a 9 out of 10!

Dark Angels - Land Speeders [yet another distraction]

What do you do when You've got a load of 'big-ticket' projects on the go, that's right resurrect a small-ticket project that's been mothballed since August 2014 as a distraction. To be fair though these are on my To Do List, however the plan was just to tackle the part painted one and leave the other but then the List states paint them both... so I undercoated it as a test of one of those £1 matt black sprays from Pound World/Empire/Land.

The result was pretty damn good, although the finish is a little 'tacky' feeling but coverage was great. You'll also notice the 'progressed' speeder has had a 'book of vengeance' added to the front. The underneath had been a bit dodgy after I removed an honour badge so I decided to cover it up. I've also added some more Warplock Bronze in places where more metallics need to be added, as I had to metalise the new one. However, as much as my metals go a long way to creating the unique look of my Dark Angels I do find the process quite demoralising. The textures and effect created is always rewarding but its another one of those tasks that I have zero desire to do and tends to kill my momentum dead! But that's a separate issue, moving on...

Bottom line, with my new found confidence in my Ravenwing I wanted to try and get a quick win with at least one of these Speeders, either way I can move them on a little bit, hopefully build up my skills even more, so tackling the Dark Talon's black elements will be easier because currently I'm a little daunted by the scale of the task ahead. This may just be all I do, although I hope to at least bring them both up to the same level, even if they're not completed.

Dark Angels - Old Skool Assault Squad Red Planet BASE!

By popular demand I'm repainting the bases on my Rogur Trader era Assault marines. I contemplated going yellow, as the Milliput sculpting is supposed to be vegetation but red was really the only sensible option. Of course this does with the fluff of the Liquid Stone Lava Fields of Ferron Proxima's Vulcan Tundra*. So, Vermilion base, Strong Tone wash, Vermilion dry/wet brush.

First highlight.

Second highlight, with a final highlight of pure pumpkin. I've since added some small amount of Bonewhite chips, there aren't many opportunities for them within the Milliput sculpting but I picked out a few, just enough to tie them to the other Red Planet bases.

While I was at it I did these five bike bases which I've had since May 2011, now you might think from recent posts these are the hurdle I'm overcoming to get the 'in stasis' Ravenwing Knights quickly out of stasis. But you'd be wrong, these are for the six other Ravenwing bikes I have, half basecoated and half not even undercoated, that I reference in the linked post. They're still destined for that role [plus another base that I'll have tomake up when I do the Knights] because they're a fraction smaller than standard bases and I can live with that on a Ravenwing squad but want consistency on the 'elite' knights.

* honest, it's real fluff, I certainly didn't just make it up to justify what I was doing, I never do that! Much...

Dark Angels - Ravenwing Knights all built

The motorbike madness continues as I manage to complete building my group of seven Ravenwing Knights. Seven is a good a number as I can run a Comand Squad with three or four and another unit of Knights with four or three in number or go for a large six man Command unit or a slightly bigger seven man Knight unit. Options are there, is what I'm saying.

I carried on with my Dark Vengeance bike conversions, the plasma pistols really do blend in nicely. I've been using a proper Stanley Knife, instad of my scalpel, to do some of the cuts on the bike and pistols. So far it's been less dangerous I think as I can just force the blade through the plastic, the heavy duty handle allowing me to exert pressure with less risk. I must admit though I cocked up with the choice of weapon, I didn't realise that pose would mean he's now physically incapable of swinging the weapon down!

Anyway, not to worry, I've since swapped the pick with one from the other 'left handed' bike and although it's still not truly dynamic at least they're realistic. This one below was the Plasma Gun armed guy. Again the Stanley knife cut through the plastic with ease and I now have a spare plasma gun arm! I also added in a Dark Angel upgrade back pack for a bit of variety.

Definitely excited about these guys, such a simple conversion to take realtively cheap and accessible and make them high value assets to my force. That said I need to do the bases which I think will delay any progress on these for a while, which is no bad theing really as I have other projects to get back to. So lets call these guys currently on hiatus, or alternatively 'in stasis' ;)

Dark Angels - Ravenwing Knights

So to treat myself for finishing the Ravenwing I surprisingly did not jump back onto the nids. Instead I made up the rest of the Ravenwing Command Squad/Knights and some mates.

I even magnetised the Standard bearer, mainly for ease of transport but I suppose I could swap another arm in for options.

Here's what I made with my ebay bike. It needed some serious shaving in the seat to make the Knight sit comfortably.

I also needed a fair few Purity Seals on the frotn wheel arch to tidy it up. Also I had to put a small plastic disc sliced from sprue into a gap in the exhaust on both sides, you can just see the different coloured plastic where it fit.

This is a Knight made from Dark Vengeance bikers and Plasma Pistols. These are Space Wolves varieties, those are supposed to be wolves on top but look more like lions to me

I went with the Power Maul, just so I'd have more of the picks for future conversions. The top of the Plasma Pistols where they join where the Bolters where, is a bit ugly but we'll see when it's painted.

The Plasma Pistols work really well and are pretty much the exact same size as the Knights Talons.

With options like this for Ravenwing it;s an amazing opportunity for a cheap army I think.

Dark Angels - To Date!

I've had a number of requests in the past to see the entire Ferron Expeditionary Force. As I'd just completed the Ravenwing it only seemed to make sense to throw everything on the table and see what I've actually achieved.

The Bastion isn't complete but hopefully I can get it and it;s twin done before Armies on Parade this year and I'll have quite an impressive looking display of my army.

And who knows what else will be done by then. Fingers crossed I can get the Dark Talon and Knight completed too, although I think it's be pretty disastrous if I hadn't completed at least one of those by September/October.

Ironically I think it's the bikes that are truly stealing the lime-light here.

They really work as my vanguard, I just hope they begin to pay dividends on the battlefield, although they've been pretty good when they weren't even painted!

The Deathwing also look pretty nifty.

Just take a close up look at the front cowl on the bike, the effect is really quite special. For all the challenges and worries this makes it all worth it. Check out the glow effect inside the Plasma Gun too, purely accidental.

Obligatory phone pics.

Now potentially this may be more than 1850pts, which was one of my To Do List goals. What will need to be considered come the end of the Hobby Season is whether 1850pts is the goal or sufficient figures to make an 'effective' list. 

I think so long as I don't rest on my laurels and continue to add Dark Angels so I have options then I may well have met that target, what do you think?

Anyway, hope you enjoyed the pics.

Dark Angels - Double Trouble army

Whilst I was taking my To Done! pics of the Ravenwing bikes I set up my Armies on Parade board to take my Double Trouble army showcase pics. Unfortunately I forgot to add the Techmarine as my HQ but nevermind.

 Not a lot to say really, its probably completely sub-optimal but its what I got and the old skool Rhino and Assault marines fits Luke's request to use old miniatures.

Bikes looking tasty amongst the rest of the squad. I can;t wait to have more bikes, I'm loving the Ravenwing now.

One question: do you think I should keep the Assault marines with green bases or re-paint the 'grass' as yellow to further fit my Ferron theme, Luke what do you think?

Looking forward to using them in a few weeks.