Streamlining my hobby?

Ok, I've accepted that I'm not going to get the list of stuff which I posted a while back done in time for Games Day. Real life's just getting in the way too much.

On the other hand, i've decided to set myself a simpler goal: Streamline my hobby.

I think it's safe to say that I've got too many projects on the go. So many in fact that I'm never likely to finish them all. Therefore It's time to have a serious think and work out what ones are most important to me. The ones that aren't so important are either going to be sold or given to gaming friends who would appreciate them more.

Once my project collection is back down to a reasonable level, I can then complete the remaining ones and start thinking ahead to new ones. Sounds simple, right? We'll see, I suppose. I need to do something though and soon, otherwise my model/project collection going to reach a kind of critical mass and implode on itself.

Anyone got any thoughts or suggestions?

Soul Drinkers WIP

I mentioned last week about how I'm resurrecting my Soul Drinkers for use with the new Space Marine codex. Well after a few days of feeling rather downhearted over the rumours of overpowered Ultramarines chapter tactics that outclassed the Imperial Fist ones in every way (Soul Drinkers are IF Successors, so I'll be using those), the rumour mill calmed down a little and started talking about more balanced rules, reigniting my enthusiasm for the new book.

So I started painting up some models.. First of all,  I was working on a Vanguard Veteran:

It's a pretty standard model atm, but I'm focussing on painting each one in stages. This guy's going to have a mutated left arm and a jump pack, but those come later.

The other model I've been working on is the start of a Terminator captain:

It doesn't look like much, but it's quite an important model to me. The Soul Drinkers only possess one suit of Terminator armour, which is worn into battle by their Master of Recruits. This gives me the opportunity to go to town and make a really unique looking Terminator character. As the eagle-eyed amongst you may have notice, I've put a FW Cataphractii torso onto normal Terminator legs.

Now I'm not going to do much more than paint the body of this guy until the book's out. Then I can see how closely chapter tactics are related to certain characters and what load-out a character using the Imperial Fists rules would benefit most from. This guy may become anything from a captain with a Storm Bolter and Relic Blade to a counts-as Lysander.



Also, with rumours of being able to ally with other chapters within the same codex flying around, I'm thinking of digging out some Sword Brethen models which I have stashed away and painting them up, along with some Imperial Fists, making a 'Sons of Dorn' alliance on the tabletop. Should be an awesome sight to see. I reckon. More on that soon though. For now, I'm off to paint some more stuff...

Huzzah! Airship progress!

 After a lot of work, I've finally managed to make some progress on the airship.

I know it's not the clearest of pictures (Ill try and get some better ones tomorrow), but as you can see, the prow of the ship is finished and the sides are pretty much done as well.

This means that the hull is nearly complete now, allowing me to to get to work on the detailing and the gas balloon.

I have to say, even getting to this stage is making me very happy indeed. This thing's been sitting half finished on my shelf for nearly two years now and seeing the progress I'm now making is a good feeling.

Hopefully I'll actually get it finished this time

BFG Thunderhawks and Dreadclaws

Next on my list of BFG progress are easily the most fiddly models I've ever built:

Forge World Thunderhawks and Dreadclaws, mounted onto 20mm fantasy bases to represent squadrons of boarding craft. These things were incredibly infuriating to mount onto small sticks to attach to the bases. I found myself cursing at them many a time, but I finally got them done.

The picture above shows them after I applied the first wash when I came to paint them. Eventually they're going to be the same shade of green as the rest of my Sons of Horus and be fully detailed. For now however, they'll do as they are. I can always come back to them later

Thunderwolf Lord WIP

No hre's something that hasn't been seen on here for a while: my Space Wolves!

Continuing with my new philosophy of 'No project left abandoned', I've been working on the Thunderwolf Lord who's been staring accusingly at me from my 'in progress' project shelf for the last year.

I finally did a bit of work on him, mainly on the gold trim and flesh tones on the wolf . His Frost Axe seems to have gone missing somehow, so I'll need to replace that at some point, but that's no biggie. I'm just happy to see progress being made.

Hochland Handgunners

I know I said I'd post more BFG, but I thought I'd post up the small amount of progress I've made on my Empire. Don't worry, the BFG stuff is still coming, but it's good to break things up a little sometimes

I know it's only two Handgunners, but progress is progress. I've got a fantasy game scheduled for next week, so I'm wanting to complete at least one unit before then.

These guys are pretty much done, apart from the barrel of their guns and a touch up on their bases. They're not the best painted models in the world, but they're pretty good by my standards and I'm very happy with them.

I hope I actually manage to get the whole unit done, as I have other project ideas bubbling away in my mind atm.

BFG Cruisers

 Continuing with my BFG progress, I have WIP's on my Styx and Devastation class Cruisers to show you.

My Styx has been named the Bloody Mummer and is quite an extensive conversion from a standard cruiser, with the addition of Imperial launch bays and armour plating, turning it into a wallowing tub of a carrier, as befits the massive troop movement capabilities needed for a Legion-scale deployment.

Of all my converted ships, this is the one I'm most happy with. Most people don't even realise that it's a conversion until it's pointed out to them, which I see as the highest compliment that anyone can give a converted model.

It still needs a lot of work done to it though, not least of which is a liberal going over with Badab Black (or whatever it is these days). It's served me well in battle already though. The last game I played with it saw it unleashing wave upon wave of Dreadclaws, allowing its CSM crew to cripple both a Mars and Gothic class in as many turns, gutting the former with internal fires and collapsing the shields on the latter so my squadron of Slaughter's to finish it off.

The Mtophep's Light (name still open to change) is a Devastation class, although I've built it so that it can be used as a Styx class in larger games. As you can see, it's in Thousand Sons colours. The fluff I'm writing for it is that it's a battered survivor of Prospero, having fled before the Space Wolves before the trap could fully shut around the system.

I originally built it so I could have a ship from each of the 30k Legions in 40k which I play represented in my fleet, but as I started building it, it kind of grew and grew. It's turned into quite a fun project as I kept on adding to it to create an eclectic and grand looking vessel such as the XVth Legion is likely to field.

Of all my ships that I've been painting, the Mtophep's Light has the furthest to go before I can call it done, but it's not high on my priority list atm, as I don't use it in my 'mainstay' fleet and is only brought out for larger games. The plan was to paint a load of escort vessels for it, but GW withdrawing their Specialist Games range has kind of scuppered that until I can find some good deals on Ebay (could be a while, as BFG stuff is going for stupid prices atm)

BFG progress

In between bouts of pondering the ethics of quitting a game, I've actually managed to get some painting done this week! I know, wonders will never cease..

Anyway, I've made some progress on my BFG fleet.

In the interests of allowing me to talk about each ship in turn, without making this an insanely long post, I will cover the progress I've made over several posts.

With that in mind, I shall begin: Allow me to present the 'Lady Amelia', an Acheron class cruiser, serving the Emperors Children legion during the Great Crusade:

This has had quite an interesting life, starting life as Rogue Trader cruiser and being built originally to serve as a Dauntless. Then I switched to Chaos as the basis for my Legion fleet and I found that the Dauntless had no direct counterpart in my new fleet, so I gouged out some the gun batteries and replaced them with lances to make a Slaughter class. After a few games though, I decided to add a few more Slaughters to my fleet, so I converted up the Aebethan and Eye of Terra, leaving the Lady Amelia looking a bit weedy by comparison.

After seeing the size difference, I decided to strip the ship down again, this time removing some more of the weapon batteries and adding a ton of lances to turn it into the Acheron class which it remains as to this day. I know that technically as a heavy cruiser, the Acheron should be bulkier than the the Slaughters, but I rationalise ity as the result of a combination of reinforced internal structure, high quality reactors to power the lances and a highly-trained Emperors Children crew to allow it to punch well above its nominal weight.

There's still a way to go on it, namely some detailing work, plus i want to cover up the remains of the batteries left over from the refitting process. then I need to try and somehow freehand the Emperors Children symbol onto it somehow.

It's getting there though. I'll show the rest soon.

Empire airship crewman WIP

I've was working on my airship and it occurred to me that it needs some crew. With that in mind, I dug out the Empire Engineer that I bought a while ago and started painting him up.

 He's nowhere near done atm, but tbh I'm just impressed that I'm actually staying focused one one project for more than a few days. This guy is eventually going to stood on the stern of the Airship, bellowing orders at the gunners below

Soul Drinkers rising

Ok with rumours and images of the new SM 'Dex coming thick and fast, I feel that it's high time I revived an old army of mine - my Soul Drinkers.

I commissioned Ron from From The Warp to make Sarpedon for me three years ago and for six months, every game I played was using them. Then I moved house and got interested in Space Wolves and they were shelved indefinitely, their models bled off to fuel other armies until only Saredon and a few marines remained.

Now though, I feel it's time to revive them and bring them back to their former glory, especially with the new 'Dex about to come out.

So here he is, fresh from a comfy life on my display shelf, Sarpedon of the Soul Drinkers chapter:

He needs dusting off and a new weapon added to his left hand, as the Soulspear blade snapped off last time I moved flat, never to be seen again. That's ok though, as Sarpedon wielded a stolen force axe in later books, so as soon as I find a suitable donor, he'll have one.

Now to dig out some marines to go with him...

Conversion Beamer conversion

(No pun intended in the title)

I'm looking at testing all the Centurion/Consul options in the HH Legion list. After the dismal performance of my Primus Medicae (didn't do that much beyond what an Apothecary could do for half the points), I'm moving swiftly on to a Forge Lord.

Essentially it's a Master of the Forge, only better (until the new SM book next month, at least). He has the ability to take upgrades from both the Centurion and Techmarine entries, making him quite versatile.

Looking through what I could take, I was spoiled for choice. After toying with the idea of a Graviton gun, I settled on arming him with a Conversion Beamer. The idea really appealed to me. It gives a rather tasty large template weapon to help with anti-horde, (something that Legion lists can struggle with in certain styles of builds), add in the fact it has serious marine killing potential at extreme range, plus it looks really cool to boot

To field a Conversion Beamer though, I first had to build one. Now, I didn't fancy buying the FW Techmarine that carries one, so I set about making my own:

Not bad for ten minutes work, even if I say so myself. It's just a shame that Centurions can't have master-crafted weapons - re-rolling the scatter on it would be brutal!

What do you guys think?

Free Company and Handgunners WIP

 Continuing with my Hochland force, I've been working on the Free Company unit that I started months ago:

As you can see, there's still bits and pieces to do on them, but they're nearly done. I still need to build a standard for them, but that can come later.

I've also started work on my first unit of Handgunners:

Note the protective vests that I've sculpted on their torsos: I figured that as soldiers under the command of a eccentric/mad engineer, the men finding themselves closest to the war machines on the battlefield would take extra precautions, in case of any 'tinkering' going explosively wrong. The helmets and plumes represent their membership of the North Wall Watch regiment.

More soon!

No project left abandoned....

I should make that my new motto.

I really need to sort out my backlog of projects, having unearthed my old unfinished Empire army as I was unpacking boxes the other day whilst moving into my new place. Therefore, my Hochland Engineer force is being added to the list that I posted last week.

Inspired by my find, I've been working on the airship centrepiece some more, expanding the wings and building up the hull. It's slowly coming together.

Anyway, here's the stage that it's at right now:

Now all I need to do is finish it and get some troops to support it.