14 Friday Aug 2015
Posted in Battlemasters, Chaos, Finished Work
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It’s been a while since I’ve completed anything I’ve liked enough to post here, but I’m happy enough with this. I think the horse is better than the rider, I enjoyed learning to do the horse. I’ve never been happy with any horses before but this time I looked at a How To Paint Horses from an old White Dwarf and this is the result.
28 Sunday Jun 2015
Posted in Chaos, Finished Work
Tags
40k, Alpha Legion, army, chaos, cultists
I am currently working on another unit of cultists. Over the last couple of years my cultists have become more like Traitor Guard and less like the first 10 miniatures out of the box painted as cultists! I am increasingly interested in making a proper traitor army using oldhammer models, and less interested in using whatever models are to hand to make a meatshield to go alongside my Alpha Legion marines. Of course, if I stop making that side of the army, I might as well try a different flavour of Chaos Space Marines too. And lo! it was decided that my Alpha Legion army was complete
The next twenty or so photos show off this army in its completeness. I’m pretty pleased with it, but there are some problems. First of all, and most obviously, quality control. Included in this army are many of the earliest miniatures I ever painted and so the quality of painting is simply pretty low (even by my standards). Secondly, I never found an Alpha Legion colour-scheme that I was entirely satisfied with, so there are lots of variations on blue-with-green-and-silver-trim. Thirdly, the style of the cultists is all over the shop. Early in my painting hobby I liked the idea of the cultist gangs being a mix of soldiers, civilians, mutants, human chaos champions and magicians, etc etc. So basically it was a bit of an anything goes, lots of fantasy miniatures with guns. Later on I decided that this style wasn’t really working and so the cultists became a bit more themed, with only the odd mutation here and there.
Less talk and more pictures. At 6th ed. prices there’s just over 4000 points here. HYDRA DOMINATUS!
The whole army – mutants and assault squads to the front, cultists next, then CSMs, with the bosses and the artillery at the back.
Tsunami of mutants! The eagle-eyed might spot a genestealer hybrid in there.
CSM Assault! Chaos Terminators, Chaos bikers, and loads of (incredibly hard to paint) Possessed Chaos Space Marines. I’m also very pleased with the Vindicator with it’s dragon skull on the barrel.
Chaos Rough Riders! My first conversion work, very rough but you gots to learn somewhere.
Frenzied Mutant Mob! You can see how I just threw everything in there. I’ve now decided that if I’ve got a couple of e.g. Dark Elves they can be part of a ROC warband rather than shoehorned into a 40k one.
Possessed and Vindicator. Both are very differently challenging models to paint.
A dastardly psyker and his cultist retinue.
A Sentinal, piloted by a crazed cultist. I love these egg-walkers!
A commissar has turned to chaos. Oh such heresy! His quad include an Heroquest elf and a Blood Bowl Chaos Cheerleader!
Another Chaos Sorcerer and his bodyguard of foolish cultists.
Alpha Legion Tactical Squads.
Uncle PusHugs, my Great Unclean One.
Big Moo. Big Moo is a Chaos Spawn, made huge and idiotic and deadly by the warping power of chaos. I really liked painting and converting this model.
“DIE YUPPY SCUM”
The Bosses: Muriel The Cancerous, Great Megarhyssa, Thorfinn, and the Slimequeen.
Thorfinn and the Slimequeen, beloved of Nurgle! The bunker behind is a card Battle Bunker from White Dwarf magazine in about 1994.
Mark IV Chaos Dreadnought. One of the first miniatures I painted!
Chaos Sorcerer Magdi and his familiar Vissel The Possessed. Confession time, Vissel is a conversion that came in a lot I bought on ebay and i liked him so much I didn’t touch him.
More Chaos Space Marines. I love the early Rogue Trader Renegades and in the next army am going to try and increase the ratio of early CSMs to modern ones.
CSM Chosen from the Dark Vengeance box-set. Fantastic models but this is a shonky paintjob.
19 Thursday Mar 2015
Posted in Chaos, Finished Work
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I recently tracked down a copy of Battle Masters from ebay. My brother had this back when I was a kid, and we got plenty of games out of it. I don;t remember painting any of the models back then, so this is all new to me. The models aren’t great, but are fairly typical of one-piece plastics from the early 90s. My favourite is the Ogre – I’m going to keep on buying BM Ogres until I’ve got a small regiment of them!
As BM is a good game, I have decided to keep the miniatures as BM playing pieces, which means affixing them to the large green plastic bases. I’ve painted these to a basic standard (even by my basic standards) but I hope that it’s good enough. In order to imply that they are Nurgle worshippers I have given then a dull green trim and dark green cloak.
28 Tuesday Oct 2014
Posted in Chaos, Finished Work
Tags
40k, chaos, conversions, cultists, Dark Vengeance, oldhammer
Right, finished basing this squad this evening. I’m not sure how successful this has been. I’ve included WHFB and LOTR figures in this Cultists Squad, and tried to draw the styles together through a uniform colour scheme and spot colours. I think it’s OK, though the drummer with the plumed hat might be a step too far. Still, I think that a group of cultists during a Chaos Uprising could be mixed up, from all backgrounds and social classes and areas of the planet and with differing dress styles. Things I like about this. I love the two old models particularly. The old plastic guards are favourites of mine, and the female guard model is great. I like her mullet! I liked painting a crude Alpha Legion hydra on the drum. I like to think that these cultists are utterly deluded. They think they’re part of the gang, but they’re nothing but fodder, useful idiots. I like the harem pants wearing LOTR guy who looks like Lenin – I gave him a plastic Necromunda arm which I think workds. I’m getting better at green fatigues and caucasian skin painting. Still no good at eyes or hair!
The full squad.
Old plastic guard and late 80s “female guard” models.
12 Sunday Oct 2014
Posted in Uncategorized
I’ve finally gotten around to basing this lad. I have no doubt that you’ll recognise the HeroQuest gargoyle. I loved HeroQuest. It was my first experience of miniatures and table-top games. What I liked about it initially was that it brought Fighting Fantasy books to life. I didn’t know at the time about Games Workshop and the connections between FF and GW. I bought more models from a local games shop, long closed, so that I could have different monsters in my games. In short order I discovered White Dwarf, Space Crusade, Rogue Trader, and Warhammer.
So the gargoyle was the centre of the dungeon, the big monster. As a model he’s basically a Khorne Bloodthirster. I think the design team couldn’t be bothered to come up with an entirely new design tbh. I’ve painted mine as a Champion Of Khorne suitable for any Chaos Army. I’m generally pleased with all of it except the damn wings. Not too sure about the snow base either. Or the sword… or…
HeroQuest time again!
06 Monday Oct 2014
Posted in Chaos, Finished Work
Tags
Alpha Legion, beastman, chaos, conversions, genestealer, hybrids, LOTR, mutants, Necromunda, oldhammer
So you buy piles of stuff on ebay but there’s things you’re not really interested in – LOTR miniatures, mid / late period fantasy troops etc. Nobody wants to swap them for anything good, they’re not really worth anything, and you’ve got more than you can imagine ever needing for bitz. My solution has been to band them together as Mutant Gangs. Alpha Legion agents travel the galaxy, seeding corruption and rebellion on every planet they can. As we know from Necromunda, mutants lurk in the underhive, angry and bloodthirsty, just waiting for the spark of revolution to be lit…. Or perhaps these are the scum that lurk in Chaos Barges, pouring forth in their millions during Chaos attacks, each bullet that ends their miserable life another bullet that can’t be used against Chaos Marines or daemons…
Back Row: WHFB Skink – LOTR Orc Halbardier – LOTR Goblin – Genestealer Hybrid – WHFB Skink
Front Row: LOTR Orc – Empire soldier (converted) – Necromunda Ratskin – Skaven / Imperial Guard converstion – WHFB Beastman
I’ve tried to include some narrative touches – for example the front row guy with the axe also has a Chaos Marine bolter, but there’s no clip in the bolter. He’s just showing off something he found but can’t use. Of course, if he’s lucky he’ll die before he gets found by a real Chaos Marine! Likewise, of course, the presence of the hybrid. Masquerading as a mutant during a chaos uprising might be a perfect place to hide until you can breed and pass on the ‘Stealer genes.
06 Monday Oct 2014
Posted in Uncategorized
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Look what arrived in the post today! Whilst I’ve read a pdf copy of Lost And The Damned fairly recently, I’ve not read Slaves To Darkness since I was a young ‘un and borrowed a copy from James Barker. James was an only child, so he had lots of expensive things like Games Workshop books and the latest Amiga computer games. Stuff that povos like me could only dream of! It was a fascinating read and I wished I had my own copy. I can completely understand why these books in particular have stood the test of time and captivate adults 20 years or more after they were first published.
This will be my bedtime reading for a few days I reckon. I can imagine that it won’t be long before I’m adding Chaos Warbands to the list of armies I am painting [currently standing at: Steel Guard Imperial Space Marine Chapter; Alpha Legion warband; Ork Freeboota Army].
I CAN’T WAIT TO GET INTO IT!
29 Monday Sep 2014
Posted in Uncategorized
Tags
Alpha Legion, chaos, Raptors, WH40K, WIP
Also on my painting table are this guys. Some might not call them Oldhammer, but they are made of lead. These are Chaos Raptors, from the early 00s. Very spiky and thus hard to paint. As you can see, I’m doing them as Alpha Legion. I’m not sure I’m going to be very happy with this gang. In order to spice it up a bit I’ve used a couple of Possessed arms and a Chaos Spawn head to mutate some of them. These Raptors are as much monster as man, throwing themselves from the sky to tear their enemies apart. These are hardly started, you’ll see them again when they’re done!
Alpha Legion Raptors
28 Sunday Sep 2014
Posted in Uncategorized
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Good evening and welcome to my Painting & Modelling blog. Rather than faff around with a proper introduction I think I’ll just dive straight in by picturing what I’ve got on my painting table right now.
This bunch are part of my ongoing 40k Alpha Legion & Cultist army. This is a Chaos Cultist Squad. The Dark Vengeance chap in the middle is their squad leader. For Oldhammer fans, there’s an early metal guards(wo)man in the front row, and a plastic Imperial Guardsman too. The rest of the cultists are various ‘human’ figures from across different ranges. I like to use colours to tie in the cultists, assuming that they’ll be people from all parts of society getting tooled up and going off to fight for their dark masters. This lot are about 50% complete and you’ll see them again when they’re done!
Cultists from across the ages!
Doris Plunger's Lead Mess 