Even more slack than usual

I've been away and round and about so I've done virtually no painting for the last 3 weeks.

Spent a week away on holiday with the kids, and then went to the US for a week with work. 18 hours flying did mean I got to catch up on few podcasts and books.

I'm continuing to read the excellent Horus Heresy series. Fulgrim is really, really good, especially the end (which I won't spoil for you). Descent of Angels which follows it is a real let down though, definitely the weakest book in the series so far, especially as it comes between Fulgrim and Legion which are two very, very good books. The story in DoA adds almost nothing to the overall story of the Heresy, it even seems to end before the Heresy has begun. Unless futures stories are going to link into it, or you're a real Dark Angels fan, then I'd say you could quite easily skip Descent of Angels in the series.

I'm at home more next week, so hopefully I might get to do some painting....

Inquisitorial Acolyte

As promised, here is the second (yes, only two) painted model in my WH army. Its an acolyte for my forthcoming and as yet unbuilt, Inquisitor.

The acolyte is based on the Empire Priest with hand weapon and shield. His shield arm was removed and replaced with a new arm (actually from the Empire flagellant sprue) and a bolter added. I also added some green stuff hair and a targeter eye, also from GS, to 40k him up a bit. The right arm, I removed the hammer and replaced it with a samurai spear from the 70s (from my Dad's airfix days) and the board with the scroll is from the flagellant sprue as well. The banner isn't actually finished in the photo, I'm going to make it look like an Inquisitoral mandate or scoll.

World's End Radio

You might already have heard this all new GW podcast, because as usual I'm behind the curve on these things. I've listened to the first episode this week, and I enjoyed it, the guys presented it were pretty professional and had some good knowledge. They're going to be covering LOTR as well apparently, which is a system I don't know much about so I'm interested to find out more about it. You can find the show at: worldsendradio.com.

Sorry for the lack of updates

Works been really busy these last couple of weeks. As for what I've been doing:

-Finished the final squad of Plague Marines for my Nurgle CSM army. They're OK, tabletop standard really, nothing too special. I'll post pics when I get some done.

-Started the second model in my WH army, the Inquisitorial Acolyte I post about a few weeks back. He's converted from a WHFB Empire Priest.

-I've been reading the excellent Horus Heresy series from the Black Library. I've read the first two books, and I'm about half way through "Galaxy in Flames".

-My wife bought a Wii, so I've been playing on that with my kids. The Virtual Console is ace, I've spent many an hour playing Golden Axe on the Megadrive again. I remember when it first came out, it was the most amazing game I'd every seen.

Vallejo Game Colour Thinner

I've been trying out this product on a couple of recent miniatures.

Previously I'd thin with water, but that will change the density of the colour. This thinner claims to thin without loosing opacity of the colour (it says so on the bottle). After trying it out, it certainly does do this well, retaining the intensity of the colour. However, an unexpected side effect is that the paint then goes on with a shiny, satin finish which may or may not be what you were looking for. All in all, it's good at what it does, but I'm really only going to be using it for certain things that I don't mind ending up a bit shiny. The shine may disappear of course if you matt varnish the miniature, so this may be a non-issue, but most of my minis just sit on a shelf and don't ever leave the room they were painted in so I don't normally bother with varnishing.

Nurgle Rhino

This is my completed Nurgle Rhino. I've tried out some of the new Citadel washes on the model and they've turned out OK. The whole model had a Thraka Green wash (straight from the pot), then the gribbly bits had an extra wash of Devlan Mud. The wash went on a bit wierd, it looked a bit foamy in places, put it was fine once it dried off.

What I've been doing

Been up to a few game realted bits this week:

-Nearly finished all three books of Dan Abnett's Eisenhorn trilogy. It is really, really good, I've struggled to put it down.

-Caught up on a few podcast whilst driving endless to things for work. Listened to a mammoth D6G episode, new 40k Radio, new Podhammer, and a couple of GW Design Philosophy podcasts. All great, except the GW ones, which are a little flat.

-Painting wise, my Chaos Rhino is finished. I'll post up some photos when I get home.

40K Priest

As promised, here's the first piece for my Witch Hunters army. The picture hasn't come out that well for some reason. It's a test for the colour of the armour for my SOBs. Overall, I'm pretty pleased with it.

Spending spree!

It was my birthday last week, so I've spent the cash I got on some new paints and minis.

Firstly, I bought a Chaos Vindicator to round out my 1500 point list for CSMs. For my Witch Hunter army, I bought the Inquisitor Coteaz box set and I really, really like the Lord model. I've also picked up a few bits from bitzbox to convert the Inq Lord. I'm going to drop the eagle and hammer he comes with an substitue it with a power sword and combi-weapon or something similar. I may add some green stuff to his head, I'm thinking an eye patch would be cool :)

I've also bought some new paints, including the new GW wash set. I have tried them out before in a GW store , and I really like them. They gather in a much nicer way than the old inks, and you get less of the tide mark effect you got with the old ones. I've also bought some Vallejo white primer. I'm intending to prime my SOB in white and then wash with Devlan Mud from the wash set to provide deep shading and black lining, something I'd normally get from a black undercoat.

I've also picked up the first 7 books in the Horus Heresy series as they were well cheap on play.com.

Painting wise, I've put a couple of coats on my CSM rhino, which have come out a bit too thick really. I've also finished an Imperial Priest which is a test figure for my WH army. I've got some photos of him but the photos suck, whereas the painting is not that bad really. Once I can wrangle a decent photo from my camera I'll post it up.

This week

I've managed to do a few hobby related things this week, despite being stupidly busy at work.

Painting wise, I managed to find time to base up my Seraphim. With the true LOS rules in 5th, I probably should have done them crouching or something but hell I like the mini as it is. I've also undercoated a squad of Plague Marines and a Rhino ready to start on this weekend.

I had a long drive on Wednesday so on the way I caught up with a couple of pod casts. The Drop Pod Cast have a new edition dedicated to 40k 5th Edition which is quite good. They've changed the shows format over the last couple of editions and I think it is much improve. I also managed to catch up on a edition of This Week in Wargaming (3rd episode) I'd downloaded a couple of weeks ago. Not much 40k related as it's pretty much dedicated to Hordes and Warmachines but this ones always an interesting listen. I notice on the site this morning they've got a new edition out as well.

I've finished reading the 5th Edition rule book last night and it is rocking. I think the new rules are a vast improvement on 4th Edition, and the background section is really, really good. I don't think the hobby section is quite as good as 4th edition though but I didn't really buy the book to learn how to paint miniatures.

I've also read the new issue of Firebase magazine, superb as always. It's like White Dwarf used to be when I started out in the hobby.

New podcasts and 40K 5th Edition

I've listened to a couple of new editions of podcasts this week. 40K Radio have got a new edition out which they've recorded on location and covering some parts of 5th edition and it's excellent as always. There's also a new edition of Podhammer out as well where they're talking about the Brettonian army list. I don't play WHFB myself (I do own the 7th ed rule book though) but Podhammer is always an excellent listen.

My new Warhammer 40000 5th Edition rule book arrived on Wednesday. I had hoped to get it a bit quicker as I'd pre-ordered it form Total Wargamer but that was not to be. Anyway, I haven't had much time to read it in detail, I've just flicked through it. I have seen a pre-release copy at a GW store and seen it in action in a couple of games in the same store. The background section of the rule book is huge and looks great, but I was a bit disappointed that there is no detailed army page for either Witch Hunters or Daemon Hunters. The D6 Generation did an awesome and detailed podcast on 5th Edition with Yakface from Dakka Dakka which is worth a listen to get the low down on the changes.

Personally, I think the biggest game changing change is the change to having only troops holding objectives. Given that 2/3 of all the missions are objective based I think this is going to change alot of lists. I've already tweaked my Witch Hunters list to drop the Dominion squad I had (they're a Fast Attack choice) in favour of another Sister squad. I'm also going to drop my Assassins in favour of some Celestians and the changes to the CC rules mean that the the Assassins (either DCA or Eversor) can't clear their kill zone on the charge so they're just going to get piled on and squashed. Maybe I'm misreading this but that's the ways I'm seeing it.

Nurgle Daemon Prince: Now with Wings!

Finally got round to getting the wings finished on my daemon prince, here's how he looks now:

They've turned OK I suppose, I'd rather not had to have added them on but if I ever want him to be effective on the tabletop he's going to need them. He was never designed with wings in mind, hence I had to do that slight rubbish "bursting out of his cloak" look.

The wings themselves are from a Tomb Kings carrion which I got relatively cheaply off ebay. I bulked the length of the wings out with green stuff to make them a bit bigger. Painting wise they're pretty simple. They're based with Catachan Green, then washed 3-4 times with Catachan Green and Chaos Black (about 2:1 mix of so). After that they were drybrushed with Catachan Green and Bleached Bone all the way up to pure Bleached Bone. The feathers had an extra drybrush, very lightly with Skull White. Finally, I glazed the bandages/skin bits on the wings with Chestnut Ink to pick them out a bit.

My new green stuff finally arrived on Saturday so I've made some progress with my Nurgle rhino. It's ready for painting now really. I've also put some green stuff detail on my SOB canoness as well, which I'm still not sure if really good enough for such a well sculpted model.

Modelling phase

The way I prefer to work when painting is to alternate from doing purely modelling (building minis, conversions etc) to purely painting. At the moment I'm jsut doing modelling. The main reason I end up working like this is I prefer to spray paint my miniatures in larger batches so I don't have to keep going backwards and forwards every week to spray new stuff, mainly because the wife shouts at me if I do. This means that currently I've got sat on my desk 7 Nurgle Marines, a nearly converted Nurgle rhino, a Witch Hunters priest, a Inquisitor Acolyte, SOB canoness, and 10 Seraphim. Still waiting on the arrival on more green stuff to finish off the canoness and rhino.

Painting wise I've base coated the wings on my Daemon Prince so they just need highlighting now.

Warhammer 40K 5th Edition is out on Saturday. I've got my copy (just the standard rule book) on pre-order from total wargamer, so I'm hoping it'll arrive early.

Work In Progress: Nurgle Rhino

I've managed to get this done this week, it's a Rhino for my Plague Marines. I've basically stuck to the principal of getting an ordinary Chaos Rhino and sticking crap on it to make it Nurgly. The grey/green lumps are not finished yet, it's just I've run out of green stuff. I've got 3 feet of it on order from ebay so that'll keep my going.

Cool Mini Or Not?

Not much to report on this week, as I've been away and not had much time for painting. I have submitted my first picture to Cool Mini or Not. It's the Nurgle Defiler you can see in the post below. I was thinking it was about a 6/10 and that is pretty much what is has got for votes, so I'm quite pleased. This is the link to it if you'd like to vote.