Caledonian Highlander wrap-up

What ho! Caledonian Highlander wa this weekend at Element Game North West Gaming Centre. I'm in the process of trying to find time to write the battle reports, at least while it;s still fresh in my mind. The headline for yours truly was 2nd place best army, beaten to the top spot by Liam and his Khorne Daemonkin. Still the trophy is cool and the £25 voucher will go towards Blood Bowl later in the year.

Game wise I had a blast and after a typcially poor start got progressively worse over the weekend until I eventually snatched a vistory from defeat meaning the Wooden Spoon prize was out of my grasp. Still, the guys I gamed with were all top blokes and that's even including two Tau players who were all booed good-naturedly throughout the weekend! ;)

While I try and fit in the battle reports enjoy the pics I took of the best army nominees. Some interesting Dark Eldar.

Blood Angels

Red Scorpions

Necrons [I faced these in an unscheduled change to my first match-up]

My own nids.

One of the two Khorne Daemonkin armies nominated.

Eventually winner, my good mate Liam's disgustingly good Khorne Daemonkin.

Selfie time, we really did have a good weekend, even if I look stunned!

Oh and then someone torched a car next to the Gaming Centre. Luckily no one was hurt and the few staff left evacuated safely.

Fire Brigade were in there in a dew minutes, putting it out even while it was still popping and banging!

Anyway, a spectacular conclusion to a great weekend.

Where's my head @?

'Conspicuous by my absence' is probably the phase you're looking for. Obviously I don't need to apologise you'd all tell me it was OK, I'd normally say politeness compels me too and apologise anyway. I'll skip all that palarver and just explain what's been going on.

Number 1 - in reasons not to be posting is 'damn drop pods'. I knew as soon as I revealed I'd be working on them that'd put a jinx [not a jinks] on them. To be fair I now understand the effort involved and I don't think it's insurmountable, I just have no desire to do it. Therefore I did do some 'on list' diversionary tasks but not much and not anything worth sharing yet.

Number 2 - my head really has been in a weird space, been quite tired and headachy so given the option of an early[ish] night I actually took it.

Number 3 - and this is the big one, I saw a job advertised last Monday. It's a big deal and although it's a fixed term contract that fills me with bowel clenching fear [when Ive been 'happily' employed in my current post for 13 years follwoing a previous redundancy] in every other respect the job is ideal. Now I have to apply and that is considerably more effort than four 250 word responses to their questions, should take.

I certainly don't think number 3 has helped with number 2 and I'm spending a lot of time trying to gather my thoughts. I had a mini battle report but couldn't find the notes and will power to get it down. Fingers crossed it's momentary and once the application is out the way I can 'look forward' to an interview or not, in which case things will go back to normal.

Anyway, no need to wory, I'm still alive and Caledonian Highlander is this weekend so I should have Battle Reports for that and hopefully an update on Birthday Bash v2.0

Dark Angels - Drop Pod[s]

Although this new project doesn't [yet] fill me with dread I have already observed that monotony will be the biggest factor in how it progresses. You have the five pod fins, but you need to do both sides and when you're actually doing two pods that's 20 of these still to do and you haven't even looked at the door petals! No doubt the door will then split up into the top, middle and bottom left and right sections, again multiplied by 10!

Anyway, as you can see above I managed to do the highlights on the first five. I now need to do the shading on inner edges of the four newer ones, then it's the other sides. What's now apparent is it takes about a 60-90min session to highlight five [unbelievable but true for me] so I've three more sessions to look forward to - yay! At least by having that in my head the task seems more manageable but even so it's a good enough excuse to take a night [or two] off.

The knock on effect is progress is very slow [which does no favours for the blog] and I'm thinking that having this separated pod will feel easier to paint than the pre-built one. I'm also a little underwhelmed by the highlights. They've been drybushed Waaagh! Flesh for the most part, which doesn't really work on flat surfaces. I'm then drybrushing some more Caliban Green on to blend it a bit more and then I'll get round to the black. It's unfortunate that a lot of the original Orkhide and black shading are being over painted now but you live and learn.

Anyway, slow but steady. Fingers crossed I can get the next three sessions in without imploding. I'll feel much happier once the fins are done.

Dark Angels - Drop Pod[s]

I'm not sure but it may well have been nearly five and half years since I last worked on my Dark Angel Drop Pod but I first mentioned it in the February of 2011 as it was a Christmas present from 2010! My original plastic crack dealer Pete got it for me so it deserves some attention finally.

Not just because it's been so long but because it may actually be worth taking and even if it's not used in any list it'll make some nice terrain too. Having left it at a black wash stage in 2011 I thought I's add a bit more shading in all the cracks and crevices.

Mainly because I'd already done the same on my second Drop Pod that I got in a trade with [the other Pete] PeteB. As you can se ethis one is already built so I'm going to comparepainting them by components and as a whole. This had been primed, painted red and then re-primed black. I then added an Angel Green primer and then with the shadows.

A quick coat of some of the last of my Tin Bitz and it's getting close to Pod 1.

There's a lot still to do but this is my primary goal at the moment. I know how infamous they ar eat breaking people, notorious for their difficulty/monotony, hence why I was reluctant to jinx it. I'd started alongside the Acid Spray but now I can devote 100% attention to it. Lets get the out of the way and off my To Do List finally!

'nids part 205 - Acid spray and weapon options

A bit of a push and I'm done, except for varnishing. I did the claw highlights, fleshy bits and veins all in the same sitting.

I also did the Crushing Claws too. Prior to painting I decided to drill out the Acid Spray fo if I decided to make the spray. Typically that chipped some of the Chitin highlights and fleshy bits inside the gun which required fixing.

I've looked at it alongside the Tervigon/Tyrannofex and although the pink highlights aren't a perfect match for what is already on the model I'm pretty sure the difference is negligible and because the fleshy bits are 'framed' by the arms that does help demarcate them so direct comparissons aren't as obvious.

Even where the feeder pipes sit on top of the belly it's not noticable as the weapon casts a shadow on all the exisiting highlights so all the colours are altered anyway. I'll be having a little photoshoot when it's all varnished but clearly the big quesiton is what's next...? Well you'll just have to wait a little while to find out ;)

6+ Happy Blog Day

The best pic I could come up with to represent 6!

6 years young, I'd say this was becoming a habit but the blog is called 40kaddict, so the clue was in the title anyways. So we've gone beyond habit and become an 'institution'? Well I should probably be institutionalised that's for sure.

6 years, who knew I'd be going this long and to the same degree, near enough. It was only ever supposed to be for 12 months every other day and then scale it back. For sure there are fallow periods and it's much more difficult to do now as I blog pretty much 'real-time' with fewer scheduled posts. But I still love doing it, OK there are times when I don't - that it's a bit of a bind but there are still times where I wish I could just empty a stream of consciousness into the thing, have it explode, be bigger and better.

Not to mention the feedback I get from you guys, the support, comments, compliments and even the insults [Ben Houghton]. Despite my own advice that you should blog for yourself first and foremost, to satisfy your need to document your achievements, I really do feel obliged to the 300+ followers and remaining casual viewers to keep up the good work.

Thanks for sticking with it and being the motivation for continuing the blog, you're all ace!

Wouldn't this be a better representation of 6...?

'nids part 204 - Acid spray and weapon options

Moving on and it's the second set of bone highlights. Once again I'm reminded just how easy nids are to paint, I'm even painting in texture that isn't there to entertain myself!

Pretty much the entire scheme is this:

1. Bonewhite
2. Chitin
3. Fleshy bits
4. Claws and teeth
5. Special FX - blood, plasma, toxins
6. Base

I don't know why but this is so much easier than any other army I've painted. Obviously the monotony can be a little debilitating but I think I'd rather have that than all the extra fiddly bits a Space Marine has.

Anyway, Bone is done, Chitin highlights are next and given little is required of that step I'm pretty sure I'll do both sets of highlights in my next session.

Which will be handy [or 'clawy'] as the CCs are now up to scratch [pun intended] too, with their own second bone highlights.

You never know, I may even get the claw highlights done too, leaving only the fleshy bits to sort out, which will obviously be a big deal on the acid spray.

 AsaltoRabioso Lleidaasked for pics of it on the Tervigon/Tyrannofex. One thing that has struck me doing this is howm much I love that Mawloc/Tfex head conversion. Sure it gets lost and is hugely inconvenient in this role but I just love the end result in it's normal guise.

Ordinarily I might consider hardly any highlights to the fleshy bits but they really need to match up with what is on the beast already. Fingers crossed I can find a way to match it up, I just think it was someMechrite Red mixed with white, or Bonewhite.

I had considered making an attchment of 'spray' - a wire frame covered in flock and glue. Regardless the spray will have the same toxin green effect to tie it altogether.

It really is a big beast isn't it! I had such a horrible experience painting the first Tervigon and then a somewhat pleasant time with this one. I'd really love a third, even though I've no need for it as I hardly run two let alone three. Even if I did want three in a list I still have my Proto-Tervigon, which if it wasn't representative of my first big conversion I'd be stripping back to be a Carnifex now!

Alternatively I'd consider making a Dimachaeron of it. That seems to be the popular conversion route and it still amazes me how much this model is to buy compared to some of the newer, smaller models that just do so little in the game.

Still, ever onwards, I:ve plenty more to paint before that's even a possibility :)

Birthday Bash 2.0* - you'll ALL be welcome

Some of you may remember two years ago I had a little birthday tournament with my mates. As you can see Liam was the victor using his Riptide spam ;) If you clicked the link you may also have noticed my birthday is in February, at least four months away. Well it's usually around this time of year that Ben starts thinking about a trip to Warhammer World - something I'm a little too tight to contemplate this time round.

So, I had a chat with the rest of the gaming crew and PeteB was well up for a mini tournament as his birthday is just before mine too. In 2015 we borrowed Ben's kitchen but this time that probably wouldn't be sustainable and in a bid to have another fun birthday celebration/gaming session I went to my local game store Wargames and had a chat with the owner Martin. He was perfectly happy for us to rock up, pay our fee to use the tables for the day and leave things at that. Alternatively he suggested a couple of other options to turn it into a much bigger event, even to ITC tournament scale! Which gave us plenty to think about.

PeteB, Ben and myself had a bit of a summit last night to discuss options. We're all after an event that is fun, not really about winning. Ben was also keen not to have Lord Of Wars, he feels they can make the game too one-sided but I fought to have them included on the basis for some folk it's the only way they can run a list. So we made some restrictions for taking them, as I said the event will be very much 'don't be a dick', we may be shooting ourselves in the foot for interested parties but we just want to have a fun days gaming. This was the interim plan [subject to change]...

Which leads us to the current knowns:

• 1500pts
• 3 Maelstrom Games
• Saturday 25th February
• Wargames, Southport PR8 1NH

There's obviously other stuff on that sheet but we're not confirmed yet. Provisionally it'll be £20 but how that translates to prize fund, food, potential painting competition is yet to be decided. Wargames usually does quite extensive prize support but much like the principles [and part of the success] of Blog Wars we agree that big prizes for the winner will not be in the spirit of what we had in mind. We'll fix costs and prizes in time.

Currently there'll be myself, PeteB and Ben, with Otty, Liam and Throne of Skulls winner Scott potentially on board. Bottom line is we only need 10 people minimum to make this happen and Martin is convinced he can double our numbers from local players but I wanted to offer an open invitation to folk who follow the blog to see if they'd be interested in joining in, the more the merrier.

So what do you think? Let me know in the comments below.

* Birthday Bash 2.0 is a provisional title, feel free to offer alternative 40kaddict related names :)

'nids part 203 - Acid spray and weapon options

Progress is relaxed at the moment, just some washes on the Acid Spray. The unfortunate byproduct of taking it slowly is there's not much to share with you guys, sorry.

Ironically I'll do what I feel is sufficient for the evening and sitll stay up till past 12! I am however taking more nights off, so I'm going to bed a little earlier on those occassions. I've had some pretty cool dreams in the process. My dreams are usually very vivid and imaginative and I often become lucid enough to affect them, unfortunately my usual five hours of sleep doesn't always allow me to get into that dream state like I used to have, still we're having some good 'uns now. Anyway this was the beginning of one evening.

And then I was able to apply the first set of Bonewhite highlights. This brings it up to the same point as the Carnifex Crushing Claws. Interestingly for those that paint there's a lot of what I do that's not thinned! I know that's heresy but I mix between thinned and unthinned paint depending on the element I'm painting and how the paint is applied.

The same definitely goes to Turquoise chitin that will going on soon. Still thinned paint is used in places but for the most part it's just not neccessary on my nids.

I actually tried this in position on the Tervigon/Tyrannofex before the highlights and it looked pretty OK, so I can't wait for it to be complete.

Next set of bone highlights on both this and the Crushing Claws...

'nids part 202 - Acid spray and weapon options

As I'm planning to run a Tyrannofex with Acid Spray at Caledonian I thought it worthwhile finishing up this little conversion. With the Tervigon's birthing sac glued in place the normal feed cannot reach around it's gravid womb so I needed to extend the tubes. Perhaps I should have taken some earlier pics but I'm not in a 'posterity' mood at the moment. What I did do was split the ammo feeds and then use floral arrangement wire to extend the pipes. Getting the wires to fit was extremely fiddly and then bulking them out was equally frustrating. I tried rolls of Milliput but it's just not elastic or adhesive enough and the more you roll it into tubes the more it wants to crumble apart. I managed to do two of the feeder pipes and then pulled the remainder off in preference of Green Stuff.

This is in fact the first Green Stuff I've ever bought/used and I must admit it did a much better job of bulking out the wire to look like tubes but my sculpting was slapdash at best so I tried to cover up my difficiencies with my old standby - PVA coated string to create veins. It wasn't too bad although the fibres in the string were far more apparent than I'd hoped. A few coats of liquid greenstuff later and I think I made a much better finish to it. I mean my Green Stuff sculpting is woeful, but this effort is sufficient. With that in mind I undercoated the weapon, gave it a spray of Bonewhite Army Painter where needed and then picked out all the fleshy red bits.

I then painted the chitin plates ready for the first sepia wash.

Two birds with one stone - these crushing claws are a hangover from my last Carnifex and I've never found the time to get them finished. As soon as the Acid Spray progress aligns with these I'll be tagging them on to painting so they can be completed.

This is actually a nice little 'between projects' job - an amuse-bouche to cleanse the palate and stimulate excitement for the next big job. The only problem with doing these is they don't feel like something worthy of completion. They're not on my list for a start and they're not a complete figure either. However, each claw is similar in scale to a Termagant and the Acid Spray is equivalent to a Lictor at least. I'll get my head round it eventually, it's only a week or two of work afterall and then I can see what's next...

What's on my palette?

Bless me readers for I have sinned, it's been just over a month since my last confession and with the completion of my Armies on Parade goals I need to take stock again.

 

Right now I'm feeling really pleased at my current progress. It feels great having already completed 3 out of the 14 [20 if you include the sub-bullets of the Genestealer Cultists]. However, despite those three goals being 'major projects' [not that I qualify them that way] they'd all been siginificantly progressed before the new season, not to mention 3 out of 20 in 6 weeks is only slightly ahead of schedule over the course of the season.

So a dose of reality with my unicorns and rainbows. And as AsaltoRabioso Lleida commented about the bastions 'you sure work hard' and if I'm honest I sure feel like it as well. completing the Bastions and the Imperial Knight has left me exhausted and although I took a few nights off during the effort I feel I really needed it. I'm not sure if it's the coming of Winter but the darker nights and thought of trooping down the garden in grim weather fills me with dread. It's one of the reasons I thought the 'Great Build' would work - no targets to finish something just build what I've got.

Project wise I do have plans to tackle three things of which I'll let you in on two, I have my Acid Spray conversion for my Tyrannofex. Because it's a magnetised Tervigon I needed to extend the tubes to go round it's birthing sack [that bit isn't magnetised]. That needs to be done and painted by Caledonian - 19th/20th November. The second item is my Tyranid VSG - I fancy finishing the sculpting on that. The third, well it's painting but I don't want to spook it just yet so I'll leave it unsaid.

Overall I want to take things a little slower at the moment. The AoP deadline was powerful in helping projects through to completion but at my own expense. I feel I need to relax a bit which may knock on the blog a bit but we've been there before when content was less forthcoming so I know everyone's all right with that. Ultimately I needed a plan and to see 'where my head is @'. So now you know nearly as much as me.