Warhammer 40k (3) - Primaris Ancient

 So, I wanted to take a bit of a break from the "rank and file" to work on a character. Originally post 3 was going to be Primaris Intercessors but I only painted 5 (of the 10) and decided I'd rather finish all 10 first. I've got a decal on this one but I'll talk more about the decal process in the Intercessor post. 

Truth be told, I distract easily. However there is a method to my madness. The plan was to paint this set off and on and intersperse it with other topics but I've since decided that I'd like to have the marine half of this set done before I start work on another rather large project. 

I did however also finish up some more Necromunda stuff that I'll throw up here before the next marine blog. 

For now though, enjoy the Primaris Ancient/ Banner Bearer. 

 

The only additional colors added to the palette here are for the Fire effect on the banner and the red on the bolter. The red is mephiston red (the airbrush version) and the fire is white base, then iyanden yellow and then gryph hound orange contrasts. 

Warhammer 40k (2) - Primaris Eradicators

 Fresh off the heels of last post, I've actually gone ahead and "finished" my first unit. I put finished in quotes as I will almost definitely go back and add decals at some point but I am out of decal setting solution at the moment. 

For this first unit I'm going to walk through more or less step by step to sort of illustrate what (very roughly) goes into something like this. 

 

 

First, before anything, I sat down and got out the kit I'd be building. These are actually push fit models and for the most part really didn't need any glue. There was one part where I opted to chop the peg off and glue the parts together for a better, more flush, fit but in general, you can build these without glue.

 There's some rather interesting use of engineering here where things like guns connect to knee pads

You can see one completed marine here.

 

The bases that come in this size, come with two holes to insert the peg on the feet into, but only one foot peg. As a result the bases each come with a little "topper" to fill the other hole. This looked odd to me at first as they all sit in sort of the same position but I felt it was fine on the finished paint job.

 The last time I painted Ultramarines was probably when I started the hobby with the battle of Macragge starter box. I gathered a few paints and set to trying to get samples.

 In the end I settled on the middle of the three, AK interactive Dark Blue. I like the coverage of it, and the GW paint but found the dropper bottle a little more alluring for painting a whole army. I suppose in theory I may add a vehicle at some point and the idea of airbrushing GW paint isnt appealing to me.

 I slapped paint all over the model, not worrying about neatness in any capacity. I used an old weathered brush for this that I didn't mind ruining and just went to town. I then gave the model a super quick rough dry brush of AK 3g Ducat Blue, just to catch some edges.

 Next was picking out details in Gold (AK Gold), Silver (AK Gunmetal), Black (AK Tenebrous Grey) and Purity seals with Wine Red and Vampiric Flesh. I did the brass of the shells with AK Copper

 

The next step was an all over wash with marine juice. This is a mix of various washes in various colors and viscosities designed to act as an all over shade to speed up painting.

 

 While this dried, I set to work on the bases. For this, I used vallejo paste. I pulled the pushfit figures oiut of their bases to make this easier. They were painted with my standard recipe of Black Grey (vallejo), and then drybrushed with two lighter greys. 

 

 Once everything dried, i reassembled and wrote this. Total time in on these was a little under an 2 and a half hours. I was mulling it over on the drive to work and I think the total supplies cost for this (not counting all the blue test colors) was in the vicinity of 150. I only note it here for posterity as these paints will be used for a lot more than this project and I've had things like my sprue cutters for the better part of ten years at this point.

 

 

 You can see a sneak peek of whats next here obviously but for the next armageddon post, it will be more showcase and less tutorial. 

Warhammer 40K (1) - Road to Armageddon

 

This, like all my part 1's, is a bit of a rambler. 

As many of you are probably aware, I used to work in a hobby shop. I worked there for the better part of 10 years and in my time there became very interwoven with the hobby. Debatably interwoven enough to do things like start a blog, or a podcast.  Since "leaving the industry" some odd five years ago I've flirted, probably more than casually with the hobby in various ways. Always participating in some capacity but discovering how I interface with it in a very different way from "the outside." I could really wax lyrical about that for hours at this point but I say all this to say I had a really interesting day. 

See, when you surround yourself 22 hours a day with "hobby people" you tend to forget what it's like for "non hobby people." I think this goes without saying but though I'm referring specifically to Wargames, Painting, Boardgames and RPG when I say "hobby,"  I do truly believe this sentiment extends to any sort of "enthusiast. Whether you collect comics, sports memorabilia, vintage 90's Vampire the Masquerade novels, or are more of bowler, golfer, sporty type, I do think that outside looking in, our hobbies tend to be a bit of a great unknown. 

This all comes to an interesting head today. Part of the company culture at the company I work for now includes a sort of annual check in. Similar to a review, you meet with your direct boss and discuss things like goals and plans for the future. Less of a review by the numbers and more a personable check in. Now obviously these are conversations any manager worth their salt should be having anyway but I think the process is a good one and it leads to interesting conversations and shared experiences. See, part of what makes these consultations so interesting is that the people giving them are sort of explicitly instructed to do "some sort of activity, that the employee chooses" they're told to get out of the office and not just go for lunch or something. My teammates chose things like the firing range, or bow hunting in the woods.  

This was something we did last year and now for two years we've chosen an activity that I think really gets to show my interests and gets me talking. Today was the second of these I've done and for the second year in a row, I've chosen to go tour a few hobby shops in our area and show my boss some of what I get into in my free time.                                

My boss is a bit of a nerd as well and is definitely aware of things like Warhammer, even having read several of the black library novels. So none of this was "new" in that sense but as he looked at some of the kits, games, books etc, beyond sticker shock, he had several questions that I really enjoyed answering because it gave me a chance to sort of be the expert and share something I take such enjoyment from. 

 One question in particular was "so is there's just a guy in here? already painted?" in reference to the Lion El Johnson kit. I found a clamshell blister and began explaining sprues and such. Also humorously he said "he's older than I imagined" to which I responded with a comment about yeah, you haven't seen him in 10,000 years, not since the heresy." 

It did really get me thinking though. I realize that most of my readers (all 8 of you) are really aware of what this hobby entails but it was an interesting peek in from the outside again. I explained sprue cutters and how the game is kind of like risk but more complicated. We had a very long talk about "if all the games are the same or if they're totally different."  For a lot of the conversation though, the subject of sticker shock, pricing, and content per dollar came up. When I first got into the hobby, 3-4 hundred bought you a decent army and now, 300 is the asking price of 2 750 point starters in the Armageddon box. 

Mostly, what got me to open up this old blog though was the thought of step by step document just how much I'm "getting out of this hobby" so to speak. I redownloaded Brushrage and was thinking about documenting fully, the painting of this box set.

To start however, since I plan on sharing this entire entry/series with my boss to show him as well, I wanted to actually take the box out, open it up and show exactly whats in it from a new persons eyes. 

You've seen the box art up top but here's what's advertised on the back, promises of miniatures and rules and more. Oddly this box contains no dice or measuring devices, making it technically unplayable as a single purchase, paint supplies not withstanding. Part of what makes the "starter sets" their own thing is inclusion of those elements.

 

 

 Opening the box we are immediately greeted by a pile of plastic frames and bases. 

 Here I've got all the Space Marine sprues laid out, with a standard mechanical pencil for scale. 

 For the most part, space marines come on one frame, orks are separate. The Comanders for each side share a sprue in this case. Presumably because they only come in this box and arent available outside of it but thats just me guessing. 

 These are each of the Ork sprues. You get two of the bottom left sprue so I've only shown one.

 

This sprue in particular I find kind of strange as it comes with 10 orks and 5 goblins by my quick glance, meaning those units are sold as one kit. I am wondering what the long term plan is for those, whether they'll be getting another set with more options or what. I have gone into this project without reading much discourse and will have to see what the community thinks. 

 The banner is sculpted but has room for an included decal or freehand design

 Below all this plastic is a pile of paper in the form of several books and cards. Having not played any of 10th edition, I don't know the role of all these components but if the project goes long enough may revisit this later. Personally, I bought these to paint and collect but am interested in giving 11th a go. 

 The core rulebook is actually a smaller format than I was expecting which is great as it makes it easier to lug to a game. In it are just rules, no story lore etc. Included is an instruction booklet that comes full of painted examples. For a new person, this is useful but a bit of a disclaimer, theres no painting instructions beyond cursory inspiration.

Another super interesting thing here to me, is this Operation Imperator hardcover book. I am at a point where I'm done buying codex's, do with that what you will. All of the lore has been pulled out of the book and sent over to this book giving some background, setting and character information. This makes this book an entirely self contained story book as it were meaning in a year or so when all the rules are invalidated with updates, this book can stay as an art book/ novella. A smart choice IMO.

I'm currently finishing another project which I'll post shortly but the next step for the Armageddon project is to pick a unit and show exactly what goes in to painting it. The plan is to share this article/series with some of my non hobby people and just give a little insight into what it is I love about this. 
 

 

 

 

 

AHPC XVI (1) - Orks for Various Purposes, Solar Auxilia

Copied below, (as usual for all AHPC Posts) is my entry this week for the AHPC

Happy New Year everyone,

This year marks my return to the challenge after changing careers (leaving the hobby industry) and having a child. I've been really getting back into hobbying this year and thought this would be a great way to keep the momentum going. Without further ado, here are some quick snapshots of some Orks I speedpainted this week. 

 

These are now super old figures that are some of the first models I bought when I first joined the hobby back in 2011. The sculpts are dated and although I love them, they're far from "fantastic sculpts worth spending time painting" if that makes any sense. I spent a day or so chipping away on them off and on. We're planning on playing Space Gits, Modulorka, Gorkamorka and who knows what else so I imagine these are far from the only Orky things I bring to the challenge this go around. 

 

I also took a little time this week to paint up a small batch of 3d printed Solar Auxilia. These have an odd spot in my collection. I painted the leader months ago so were not counting him for points but I wanted to show the "squad" together. 

 

I play a bit of 30k and have a Word Bearers army. I printed some of these from Red Makers around the time of the plastic release with the vague intention of making a Zone Mortalis force. When I ran some numbers and did some math I realized just how many figures I'd need and pivoted to something else. For now, these are going to count as Space Marine Scouts for a game of Shadow War Armageddon because why not. They're a pain to paint and I really have no desire to do a whole army of these any time soon but I think they're kind of neat. 

So all told, 15 28mm figures x 5 points for a total of 75  

Experimenting with Slap Chop and Modulorka

Hi, Long time no see.
I won't bore you with the details but it's been a busy while since I've seen you last. I changed careers, moved, and got married since I last sat down to write an actual article. Needless to say, I had a busy year. Let's dive right into the topic of discussion though and wrap with some thoughts on what's next at the end. 

If you're like me and you tend to put YouTube or miniature podcasts on in the background while you paint, you've almost definitely heard of SlapChop painting by now. The term seems to have been coined by The Honest Wargamer and you can see his original video here. Long story short the technique is as follows. Prime Black, Drybrush grey and then pure white, finally slather the mini with "contrast" paints. I put contrast in air quotes now because the technique is definitely not limited to Games Workshop's official contrast range and will definitely work with other companies equivalent ranges (like the new Army Painter Speed Paints or the upcoming Vallejo Xpress Color)

 

When I first saw this I was skeptical. My first thought was definitely something to the effect of "yeah, its called painting, why bother with the fancy names?" I'm a big fan of contrast style paints and my biggest criticism comes down to the marketing approach of "one thick coat" not being the whole story. I think like any other paint, its a tool and it should be used "correctly." The main focus of the technique is to get stuff on the table, in a reasonable amount of time, to a decent standard.

As I mentioned, this is pretty topical now, with several content creators all posting their take on it. I wanted to give it a go myself but was looking for a project to use it on. This Video by Miniature Hobbyist popped up on my feed right around the same time This Video popped up by On Table Top. GorkaMorka, 3d printing and a quick project all in one go. The stars have aligned. Modulorka is basically a free to play Ork on Ork skirmish game. Currently free to download, they also have a kickstarter and a patreon going if you want to support them. The free rules bundle comes with a single ork infantry figure. It took about two hours to print and came with both supported and unsupported versions. There was a super minor defect on my print that is more than likely my settings but I left it as it looked more orky to me anyway. 

 I printed, cured and then cleaned up the pieces and then followed the steps as instructed. Black, grey, white primer applied I began with the slapping.

 I used the relatively new Gutrippa Flesh for the skin, and then Snakebite Leather, Wyldwood, and Black Templar for the majority of the details. I was originally going to paint the club the old fashioned way but settled on the new Garaghak's Sewer. I wasn't willing to skip metalic paints however and painted all of those details with 3G Gunmetal. I also painted the base in my usual methods with a block paint and few layers of drybrushing. 

Here's the kicker. It's just like using contrasts normally but I think generally speaking the results are a lot better. In particular what this method did to the skin, club, and boots, I'm thrilled with. Some issues that stood out are the usual issues with contrast, you still need to be wary of pooling and the reality is some colors simply don't show up over dark surfaces (like the skeleton horde I used on the teeth.)
 
As I said earlier, I was a little hesitant when I first came across this whole viral sensation. Not necesarily because I didn't think it would work but more so because it was sort of being sold as a one stop shop in the same way contrast was originally. Theres still certain things I'll always paint traditionally (mostly metalics) but in general I was pretty pleased. I used the brushrage app while I painted and the whole model including the base and drybrushing was less than an hour. Now that I've done it once I could easily cut that time per model down drastically and I definitely think the added step of drybrushing is easy enough that I can't imagine using contrasts over just a white primer any more. 

It gets better

After painting this guy, writing this article and sitting down to another paint session I did an entire starter force for modulorka. All 4 guys including the bases came in at 1 hour and 46 minutes once I had a scheme. 

 

This was originally written in October of 2022.