40k King Tiger Vanquisher WIP 3

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Still chugging along... 

Note how much better the tank looks when the gun-to-turret sizes are better proportioned as compared to GW's actual Leman Russ offerings.

The main body is 'done' essentially, barring the tools, tow chains, etc.. Those are primed black and just need some dry brushing to add detail/dirty up before popping them into their allotted slots in the hull.

Hmm, those exhausts are a bit too clean...

The tank looks much more complete now that the turret is assembled and attached! The fit is snug but does fully rotate. I trimmed down a Grymn Sergeant who is speaking into a comm-link to serve as the tank commander. 

Cutting him in half at the waist (gulp!), I removed his hand and rifle then shaved down his right arm for a still snug fit. I found a spare button (from who knows what article of clothing) that fit perfectly into the underside indent of the turret/hatch bottom to affix his now severed body to for good measure.

Jeez! Even these little guys have to squeeze to get in!!

The Mechanicum Onager Neutron Laser-turned-Vanquisher cannon fit almost perfectly, only needing the barrel's end point trimmed off  where it meets the mantlet for aesthetic reasons. I did add a co-axial heavy stubber but as expected it popped off at the lightest touch, and I'm loath to drill into the turret at the seam to secure it better. Thus I'll just leave it off. 

Double tap the cannon? Yes please!!!

In 40k now, the Vanquisher can fire twice if the tank is stationary or moving at half speed, and better yet doesn't suffer the -1 to hit (which EVERY fucking tank ought to have!). Though curiously, not the hull mounted heavy stubber. I'll still pay the points for the nonexistent heavy bolter to keep my list 'battle-forged', but that's of little concern as the tank is essentially the same point cost as it's 7th-ed incarnation was. 

Now I just need to get some more desert tan spray to re-prime the turret and hopefully get this project moving towards its conclusion.

Salamanders Primaris Intercessor Sergeant

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Yup, my XVIIIth legion 30k army just got it's first primaris marine! So...like the Blackshields, my Salamanders will be pulling double duty as well. Hell, also like the Blackshields, they're more likely to see action in a game of 40k than they are in 30k anyways...

This mini needed a few changes before painting though. I got my primaris marines 2nd hand off of ebay, and this one in particular had a terrible pose. He looked like he'd been shot in the back and was taking his last few stumbling steps before falling dead. So I swapped out his right arm as well as his helm for that of a 30k Mk IV marine, which is almost identical aside from being adorned with what my Beloved Wolfy calls 'the toilet brush on top'! The pose is still a bit awkward, but it works.

That however was the easy part, whereas painting this was a bit of struggle. Apparently you can only re-thin GW's paints just so many times till the paint says: fuck you pal, I'm done! Such was the case with my Chaos Black, Bleached Bone and Ironbreaker paints (not like they're essential). I managed to slog thru it though only to find that I was down to the last dregs of my Army Painter Strong tone wash as well. 

Overall I'm happy with this guy and will next paint a Rainbow Warrior Primaris Sgt. once I restock my paints. The other five primarises (Primarisi? whatever) will just remain primed and switching their allegiances on a per game basis until I can bolster their numbers up to ten and officially split the squad in two.

Meng King Tiger WIP 2

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I'm chugging along, albeit slowly. The top and rear hulls are now attached and base coated as well. A note on that: being a snap-fit model, once the hull is assembled, it ain't coming apart! So make sure you have the tracks on beforehand as I don't envy anyone trying to put them on with the fenders already in place...

You can see how well I planned out this project by just how poorly
the road wheel colors match up with the hull's camo...

I'm pretty happy with the camo thus far, though I'm thinking it might need a bit more green. Dunno, we'll see I guess. I lost the hull mounted MG when I tried to force the bit into it's allotted slot and it instead popped out from between my fingers and disappeared into thin air (seriously, I didn't hear it even hit the floor)! A short, profanity-laced search ensued, but ended quickly when I spotted a spare heavy stubber.

I still need to add the details, like shovels, tow chains and the like.

I shortened the length and it fit into the hull mount w/o any further modification needed. So, whilst I previously was debating using this for a resurrected (in some form) Bolt action army, instead I'll stick with my original plan and use it as a Vanquisher for 30k/40k. To that end I ordered a Onager Dunecrawler's neutron laser bit to use as a vanquisher cannon. It ought to fit to the turret's gun mantlet perfectly!

With some luck, I'll have the hull done and the turret in-progress by this time next week.

So after a few games into 8th ed 40k, thoughts?

Yes, I have a few.

Well first of all, I've noticed that game night attendance has been up and more games have been played which is really good for our group (which was on life support just a few weeks ago). Is 8th the best edition ever? Opinions vary, but in mine: no, not at all. So do I like everything about it? Obviously not. Can I still have fun playing it? Yup! Quite a bit actually (just waiting on Bob to eventually come around and reach that same conclusion as I have).

Let's face it, there has never been an edition of 40k where I thought every rule made sense or was okay with me, tis' the nature of the beast. But its still a pretty good game I guess. There are two things in particular though that are starting to really annoy me. 

First up: Mortal Wounds.

In a nutshell, Mortal Wounds are a stupid fucking mechanic created for AoS, and they should of stayed there. Seriously, what the actual fuck is the point of an invulnerable save, if the model with one is...ya know, vulnerable to mortal wounds?

Shadow Sun's escorting squad of six stealth suits was wiped out before ever getting to do anything on turn 1. That said, they died only due to the apparent requirement of ENTIRE Dark Angel army shooting at them exclusively.  

Example: Commander Shadow Sun, badly bloodied and falling back but still protected by -1 to hit, 3+ save and a 5++ invulnerable save, plus command points to help keep her in the fight. Sounds like a tough cookie right? Wrong! Psychic power, mortal wound, dead...get her off the table. The point to all of her fancy rules are what? Naught apparently due to an all to easy to cast psychic power. 

Very quickly our local beer and pretzels crowd group is devolving into how many mortal wounds can be SPAMMED per turn. For how many editions now have 'remove model from play/completely unsavable attacks' existed? 2-3 editions? Whilst few, they've all been the most maligned of rules, so clearly we needed to not only keep that BS around with Mortal Wounds, but make 'em omnipresent. 

A hellacious Custodes v. Nids slugfest on a table nearby...

The only two weapons in our particular Tau arsenal that can inflict mortal wounds are the Hammerheads' railguns, and even then only on a to-wound roll of a 6. That said, we found out that with good rolling a Hammerhead's railgun can still insta-pop a space marine dreadnought with one shot! Just like days of old...also like the olden days: Saturday a Dark Angels' captain has joined Tyberos the Red Wake in changing his last name to the Red Mist due to those same railguns!

My second gripe: Command Points.

My oh-so-beautifully painted adversaries.

Okay, you can spend a CP to make a reroll here and there, attack out of turn (by the way, can your opponent also use a command point negate that? It came up and we couldn't figure it out), or use a funky little strategem here and again. Cool. However GW gave the DA a warlord trait in which, on a 5+ roll a used CP is given back. So with good rolling (it happens to some people Neverness) its like having an infinite supply of CPs. So just about any failed armor save on someone/thing of better than average value is rerollable,  and almost every failed psychic test or perils is negated...yeah that shit gets real tiresome really fucking quick!

Also the 'wait, maybe I have a stratagem I can use to help/negate that' (followed by shuffling thru  2 dozen cards and the reading of too much fine print) slows the game down considerably. I can think of 2 rolls I should have used CPs to reroll in hindsight, but I think the never ending supply of them from across the board (till the railgun/red mist incident cut off that almost infinite supply) was annoying me so much that I just ignored mine altogether. I get what GW was going for, and they do have their uses, but they're easily open to abuse I think, especially in this particular situation thanks to that DA warlord trait. Dark Angel opponents should expect to encounter this frequently.

This is what a 22 model, $350 (WTF?) army looks like....from what I overheard however, I'm in no rush to fight 'em.

So...yeah, its still not the best game, and I'm having fun for the most part, buuuut those two complaints (the 2nd only came to the fore this past weekend) are starting to gnaw away the fun. 

Aww, its a 'Cute' King Tiger!

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I first saw this model on Inso's World where he's been converting them into Leman Russes of various types. Its adorable and I wanted one to use as a Vanquisher for my 30k Outremar Militia forces. 

Even with shipping, this clocked in at less than 1/3 the price of a Leman Russ!

Its debatable as to whether or not any modifications would be required to 40k it up, though I'm still considering it. Regardless, I'll just downgrade the hull mounted heavy bolter to a heavy stubber, which is already the go-to anti-infantry weapon of my Outremar army. 

That or I could use it for Bolt Action. True, I don't have a Bolt Action anymore...however Tiger II's start at the 500 point mark, which is what my old BA army maxed out at! Barring getting lucky with the one-shot airstrike/artillery barrage, that army would have been all but helpless were a Tiger II to appear across the table from it (epitomizing the Tiger Fear rule).

Given the overlapping running gear, I opted to paint-as-I-go with this tank and thus far, the road wheels and tracks are as far along as I've gotten. Indeed, by going for the multi-colored wheels I made life rather difficult for myself as I had to go all the way up thru the dirtying up phase for them, despite the fact that most of the tank is still on the sprue!

This was far more tedious than it looks...

In hindsight, I've really been kinda spoiled by GW designed tanks, as virtually all of their tanks' running gear is concealed from both view and the paint brush! Next up will be camouflaging the top hull and fenders before attaching it, as I don't want to get paint all over the finished treads (and sloppy as I am, that would happen!). Also, this is a snap-fit kit, so getting glue all over the paint isn't a concern.

Oops. I guess there should have been one more green wheel instead of a reddish one.

There are several other tanks available in this series, and I'm all but certain that I'll eventually get at least one Sherman to use as a grot tank. I've already seen a few good examples around the ol' interwebz used for that purpose and they really do make for a good proxy!

Its just about the right size too!

WIP Grot Tanks

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I've been wondering what to do with my Rivet Wars Stug walkers. They were originally supposed to be Armored Sentinels for my Grymn IG army, but then my Grymn migrated to 30k and its Imperialis Militia. In 30k they won't work as (1) there are no armored sentinels and (2) the unit size minimum is 3, and (3) the cost of acquiring more of these has become cost prohibitive.

Skittering noises will be required in the movement phase! 

So, what to do with these otherwise great minis? I tried selling 'em on ebay to no avail, leaving them to collect dust once more before deciding to use 'em as Grot Tanks! Grot tanks have a minimum unit size of 4, however you can field an understrength sized unit as an auxiliary support detachment for -1 command point. So, Grot tanks it is!

The painted one may needs some more gubbinz prior to being painted.

I just have the two for now, the painted (and soon to eventually be repainted) one has a multi-barreled big shoota, and the other has a grotzooka, loaded with Stikkbombz (indeed, one is even protruding out of the muzzle). If there's one thing to be said about grot tanks, its that consistency is not a concern. So in the future I can add other small vehicles of some sort to flesh out the unit to the minimum of 4 (or more)

30k Pariah Medusa / 40k Vindicator is complete!

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I got in a goodly bit of brush time this week, and opted to spend it on my Medusa/Vindicator. Sure, sure, some Ork units probably deserve paint more than this after last weekend's game, but oh well. They'll just have to wait.

The starting point from this tank's last appearance on here.

In 30k, Blackshields have access to Pariah armor and weaponry, so why not vehicles too? In this particular case, It'll serve as a Medusa (on a rhino hull), with the same stats/point cost as the original. The only difference will be the omission of the hull mounted heavy bolter. Call it the cost of proxying.

The basic (and as usual, sloppy as hell) color base coats and dry brushing. 

In 40k, this will serve as a Vindicator with my Chaos renegades (yes, said renegades are in fact my Blackshields from 30k). Given that I only have one opponent with which to play 30k, I figure making the army cross-compatible with 40k is a good idea. In the latter case, they'll be recently-minted renegades, and thus bereft of the usually over-abundant spikes and mutations on every surface of...well, everything..

Edges all cleaned up and ready for decals!

The decals are a mix of those from Fall out Hobby's Evil Machine Cult and the Betrayal of Calth's Word Bearers. The two work fairly well together I think, and give it a fairly unique appearance. After applying the decals I finished up the sensor pod, the right 'eye' of which I drilled out to serve as the pintle mounted combi-bolter.

Following that I got to the fun part and dirtied it up. Nothing too heavy though as I didn't want to obscure all of the runes. Also, unusually for me, this tank is bereft of battle damage or scarring, not even any rust. I suppose I got ahead of myself as I usually add that before the dirtying up part. Oh well, I guess it's a new build.

Ta dah!

The cannon's operating instructions no doubt....

...and the loading instructions, lol.

Quite intimidating from this angle!

I wanted to use the lens in the mouth as the gun, but from the side, there's nothing behind it really, meaning there was nothing to resemble a weapon's housing.

In studying after action pict captures, Imperial observers from both millenia have found these runes and symbols to be mystifying.

Anyways, I'm quite pleased with the end results.

RED WUNZ CHOP FASTA!!!!

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Ya know, in the end, out of all of my minis and all of those that I have ever taken a brush to, I think Orks are by far the most enjoyable to actually paint!

There's no worry about consistency or conformity because...well, Orks don't give a shit about any of that. Essentially each Ork model is a 1-off paint job which frees up my mind to go off in whatever direction it wants to whenever I paint Orks. Speaking of, here's my latest:

Can't help wonder if that choppa qualifies as an Axe of Khorne... 

All it takes iz some gubbinz and a Shadepire Ork instantly fits into 40k!

Currently this nob leads my only slugga boyz mob, and made his battlefield debut this past Saturday. Keeps your eyes peeled for an upcoming battle report on that adventure over at the Neverness Hobby Chronicle!