Black Dragons Ballistus Dreadnought for Dreadtober 2023 (pt.2)

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The flesh is weak?

Were this an Iron Hands dreadnought, then I'd be damned near done as large swathes of the machinery bitz have been dry brushed with leadbelcher. A few other bitz and bobs have had other metallic colors applied, but that's about it. This however is not an Iron Hands dread, so instead this week's forward progress can best be described as: minimal.

Its all so...monochromatic. Its seriously giving flashbacks to my old 4th ed. Iron Hands army.

30k Breachers

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Breachers have always been my favorite squad type in 30k, but until now I've never had any. Clocking in at about $100 for a squad of 10 plus shipping from England was too rich for my wallet. Then FW became available in the USA, huzza-wait what? A price increase? Great, now they're about $112, plus shipping and sales tax. Bleh.

Recasters clock in at about $65-$70 for a squad of 10, but I found these on ebay for $48, a definite bargain! The seller said he thought these were recasts, hence the low price. However if they are, then I sure as hell can't tell from the casting quality.

Only two had minor build issues with poorly positioned guns, so I popped those off and replaced 'em with a flamer and a combi-flamer (in the latter case promoting that grunt to squad sergeant). They have Thousand Sons shoulder icons which I'll have to remove, but as these are resin minis that ought not be too difficult.

Last Spring, when finances were getting frighteningly tight, most of my 30k stuff went the way of ebay to cover the bills (meaning I haven't played the game in a long, long time!). However skipping forward to the present, along with the minis above, I also picked up 10 decently painted MK IV bolter grunts on ebay for $33!

These additions have finally given me 30k's two quintessential troops choices: breachers and a tactical blob squad. Adding them to the remnants of what I already had brings me up to about the 1000 point mark. I'm calling this army 'done' from a purchasing perspective for the foreseeable future, and I hope to get some 30k games in with Bob here in the next few months. For bigger games, I have my Imperialis Militia horde, but I prefer smaller games so as not to get overrun with heavy armor, against which I simply cannot compete.

Samuel L Jackson, the Resurrection!

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Nope, no progress on the mechs, instead...

Whilst this pic better suits the mini below, Jules from Pulp Fiction is,
I think Samuel's finest acting performance! 

Waaaaaaaaay back in the day (pre-blog times) I had a sizable Iron Hands army lead by the infamous Iron Father Samuel L. Jackson. I used a techmarine as a base for the conversion as I didn't like the actual Iron Father mini, and later on he was cross-promoted (though to the Iron Hands, it was probably more like a demotion) to a captain when the Iron Father rules went away with an edition change. He was armed with a combi-flamer and a trimmed down chainsaw off of the IG Sentinel kit.

When I was tired of the monochromatic-hell of that army, I ebayed 'em but Samuel had earned himself an honored spot on my Hall of Heroes (HoH) display stand, where he lived out his dusty retirement until...I bumped the shelf atop of which the HoH was sitting. Unfortunately Samuel took a tumble to the floor and shattered into his constituent parts! Not having any use for him at that point, I collected his remains and tossed them into the purgatory of my bitz box. 

Whilst this mini lacks the afro and mutton chop side burns, UI have no doubt he'll be shouting Ezekiel 25:17 throughout every battle!

There he rattled around amongst years of collected gaming spares and detritus till I decided to resurrect him a little ways back. Had I thought it out properly (rather than just on impulse), I would have stripped his paint first but oh well. I added a pack and 2 bolt pistol hands, added a new 32mm base and ta-dah! He'll now be a 30k Moritat for my Blackshields/Renegade Iron Hands army. The arm on his pack is less a servo-arm and more a mechandrite. In-game it serves no purpose, aside from adding some visual appeal. Instead I figure it would assist in reloading his pistols, especially as it would be able to swivel around and actually reach the ammo pouches on Samuel's pack!

It was no picnic repositioning that fiddly little servo-arm...

With so many half-done projects already in the works, I have no idea when I'll actually get to painting him up, though given my usual tendencies...probably Tuesday!

The struggle is waning...

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Well, with the latest and hopefully final paradigm shift (for awhile anyways) having now passed. My Beloved Wolfy and I are settling into our 'new normal' once again. One particular boon of this latest change is the return to a consistent, daily chunk of time that can be easily used for hobbying, huzzah! As such, I was able to finally finish up my Renegade Iron Hands/Blackshields fire support squad:

Lousy photos equals: fun with filters!

Now along with my Medusa, both of my two heavy choices are painted, I'll next turn to that woefully neglected portion of my 30k force org: Troops!

*****

On the Kill Team front: after another two games my Silver Drakes remain undefeated, though admittedly, the last game was won by only the slimmest of margins! Whilst the realization that my marines have a WS/BS of 4+ continues to throw my opponents for a loop, it luckily hasn't proven to be too much of a hinderance to me. 

SMURFS!?! Attack! ATTACK!!!!

What will hurt here shortly is the rising point costs associated with going up in levels! I have a 7 strong team, leaving one extra to fill in for whomever is convalescing. However I'll only be able to field 5 at best now, or possibly just FOUR! (gulp)

What's a little brawl amongst battle brothers, right? Oh, that genestealer masquerading as a lamp post? Meh, let the Salamanders' scouts handle that....

On the bright side though, I took out Matt's level 3 Genestealer Cult Aberrant team leader! Yup, he's dead Jim. Appropriately enough, Matt's morale resource value is now the lowest in the league!

A wiley Matt, lurking in the shadows...

A base fit for a bug...

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Hobby time has unfortunately been at the minimum here of late, too much adulting going on. In fact I only just put the decals on my renegade Iron Hands Sunday evening, inking them last night. Whilst those were drying, I set about positioning the bitz I purchased for the base of my 'nid kill team's Tyranid warrior leader from my previous post. 

Sometimes there's just no escape...

When all is said and done, the escape pod will have the hatch attached and like my Silver Drakes, this too will be a snow base, with the skeleton half covered with snow flock, whilst the pod have snow collecting inside. 

I also bought two primaris helmets to decorate the bases of a pair of Termagants who will serve as specialists. While you're allowed up to have up to three specialists, Termagants are limited to only having the scout and veteran specialist abilities. Thus, I'll see if one of the local 'nid players have a genestealer that they can spare to flesh out my roster with it's third specialist.. 

A few pops of color...

...just to break up the monotony.

Decals (and their associated profanity) are in-progress. Sorry about the flash,
its turned the skulls on the bases into little white blobs. 

Notta whole lot else going on though, just another busy week. Saturday I'll get in another round with the Silver Drakes and hopefully...well maybe, I'll finish these guys off soon as well.

Monochromatic flashbacks...

Way back in the day...

...I had an Iron Hands army. It was big, pretty effective on the table, and most of all, it was booooooooring to paint! Black armor, white guns and boltgun metal trim...and other than a few bitz and bobs in various colors, that was pretty much it. Painting it was monotonous as hell!

Still in the very rough initial stage. 

Skipping forward to the present, I started painting a quartet of renegade Iron Hands/Blackshields for 30k and as this post's title says: I'm suffering from monochromatic flashbacks. I'll do my best not to fall asleep whilst painting 'em. When finished these four along with their previously painted sergeant will give me a fire support squad for my little 30k army (and then I'll paint something both entirely different and decidedly more colorful).