I got this rhino years ago in a joblot of battered vehicles and unfinished conversions that caught my eye. It was covered in mud-effects and patchily painted. I scrubbed off the mud effects, stripped the paint off it, added a space marine sticking his head out and a generic cannon that could be a counts-as for a storm bolter or even a predator cannon if I wanted. I then used a thinner mud effect to give it a bit of verisimilitude. I am quite pleased with this, it looks battle damaged but functioning, very Steel Guard-esque (Imperial Fists descendents with a touch of the Death Guard infantry slogger mentality).
A quick Steel Guard squad, using a sprue of modern marines that I had lying around. They look alright but they’re not as characterful as the old ones, are they?
I haven’t painted sergeant helmets white before, but I think I’m going to stick at it, I think it adds a nice flash of colour. Of course, the first third of the chapter don’t have white helmeted sergeants, but it’s my goshdarned chapter and I declare it OK.
The Steel Guard project continues, bit by bit, and here we have one of the senior officers of the chapter. Chief Librarian Blasst has faced daemons and heretics and possessed psykers and really angry dogs, and has overcome them all. He is a fearless battler against the dark and was bloody hard to paint because of all the tricky detail!
Just a quick one this time – a drop pod for my Steel Guard. I was going to experiment with my new airbrush but I got distracted and forgot and just painted it! If I ever do another one of these I will do the red and grey the other way round so that the aquilas show up better.
The final thing I’ve finished recently is another squad of obsolete marines for the Steel Guard. Apparently Assault Squads are completely pointless in 8th edition because there are flying primaris marines who are much better. I expect the same to be the case in 9th, but if oldhammer is about anything its about playing for the love of the game and not picking your team based upon a complex series of equations most guaruanteed to deliver victory. I hope to play more games of 9th edition than I did of 8th (i.e. five or more games), but I reserve the right to throw an assault squad onto the table if I feel like it.
The highlight in this squad is that Ive slipped in a christmas marine, as I felt that his wobbly stance would work as a landing pose. You will probably agree that is doesn’t particularly, but that’s life. Sergeant Plaid is a Space Crusade sergeant whose fat power glove should have been painted as a foam fist really. Next time!
Just a quick update before I get to some juicy stuff later… Brother Russkikh is a lovely old Rogue Trader Chaplain which has some fantastic details on it but a horrible helmet. I did the best I could with the face but it doesn’t look very skull-like. I have to say that it looks better in the metal, as it were. The picture here is not very flattering at all! Oh well, its hardly spoiling my chances of getting called up for an invitational 😀
I was sorting out my painting miniatures recently, following our house move. Clearing out the old and tidying up the new, that sort of thing. I was putting all the minis from the various games, assessing what i had completed and what I hadn’t so that if a visitor expressed a desire to play e.g. Burning of Prospero, I knew whether the minis were painted or not and if so, where they were. It turns out that, either by forgotten design or a common-or-garden brain fart, I had painted all the Iron Armour marines as Space Wolves. That wasn’t so bright, I needed a squad of Thousand Sons or the game would be wrong! I lacked a spare squard of Iron Armour or similar 30K miniatures and didn’t want to buy a set as I have more marines knocking around than I will ever get round to painting (and I sold off a big box recently too!). Instead I fished out some ‘old’ marines, making a squad of marines from the Imperial Space Marines, Space Crusade, and 2nd Edition box set (with a Tactical Space Marine as a sergeant). I gave them a random set of weapons to imply that this is a rag-tag collection fighting a guerrila war in the ashes of their home using whatever weapons they can find. Painted them as quickly and as roughly as I could (maybe contrast paints will make this sort of thing even easier). Nice work. Now does anyone want a game of Burning of Prospero?
Its been a long eight weeks or more since I moved house again. A very busy eight weeks in which I have hardly managed to do any painting at all. But fortunately the Steel Guard paint-scheme is very forgiving, so here’s a Razorback in the colours of the 7th Company. Really this was an excuse to paint the rider, Lieutenant Ryen, as he hops a ride. I don’t think that modern GW does miniatures like this one anymore – he’s never been a gaming model, always just a spot of character sitting on a rhino chassis somewhere. I love his expression, chewing on a cigar, never mind that his pauldron (is that the shoulder pads?) is missing. I’ve also tried to paint the gunner as a techmarine – once upon a time all drivers and gunners were techmarines I think – well, they are in the Steel Guard! Happy Eggmas to all my readers, think of us sad diabetics when you’re guzzling your chocolate eggs!
Another Steel Guard squad, plus another Captain for the Command Team. I’ve painted one of the Space Wolf Captain minis before, for the Captain of the 3rd Company. That time I experimented with non-metallic metals, attempting a gold armoured marine. It wasn’t especially a success, though I might try again sometime now I’ve had a few more years practice. I’ve been trying to clear my leadpile recently, having moved countries to glorious Cymru and having therefore to have to confront the sheer piles of stuff I own. I’ve sold off all the mid-period miniatures, leaving only the cool old stuff and some of the brand spanking new sweet miniatures the GW workshops are cranking out these days. Thus this squad is all classic minis from the days of Rogue Trader and 2nd Edition, and I think it looks before it, don’t you?
Doris Plunger's Lead Mess 