Njal Stormcaller WIP

It's getting depressing just how many back projects I have to clear.

Well it seemed like a simple enough goal to set myself: Build and paint all your half-finished projects, before you buy new models. That way I'll have a load of finished armies and will save me some money while I'm working on what I've already got.

Seems fine to me, I thought and promptly started cataloguing every single model I had left unfinished, so I could tick them off as they were completed and I could see what I have left to do.

Two days and over 300 models later, I was barely half way through my collection, but I persevered. Eventually I had a comprehensive list of what I needed to do and set to work, painting an entire Mordheim warband in an afternoon and feeling very proud of myself. i ticked them off and took a well earned break. Everything seemed to be going well.

The my flatmate asked me to find something in the cupboard for him. Rooting around for it, I found a box containing my half-finished Space Wolves army gathering dust. I swore rather loudly at this point.

So anyway, I decided to pick up a pot of the new GW dry paints and paint them up staright away, taking me a step closer to that magical point can start buying GW models again and making sure I didn't need to enter them onto my list, taking me further away from my goal than I had been before I painted the Mordheim warband

Anyway, here's Njal Stormcaller, half painted.



I used a heavy drybrush of Etherium Blue over a Chaos Black undercoat as a base, then applied a light wash of Badab Black to create the stormy-grey colour I was after.

After that I applied various washes to various parts of the the model to bring him to how he is now.

Mainly I just need to paint details like his beard, tailsmans and staff, then base him, then he's done. The rest of my Wolves will be painted in pretty much the same way, which hopefully will speed up the whole process, seeing as the Etherium Blue condenses what used to be about five different layers of painting into one drybrush.

All in all I'm proud of the way he's turned out, despite the rushed paint job. Once I've got pictures of them, I'll put up my Grey Hunters i painted in the same way, as I think it's a great and speedy way to churn out a Space Wolves army

Bjorn the Contemptor WIP

Here's a little preview WIP of my Bjorn the Fell-handed based on the Contemptor chassis.

The way I see it, Bjorn really should be in one of these anyway, seeing as he dates from the time of the Heresy, plus it looks really powerful and imposing - just the way Bjorn should be.

I need to sculpt some details to make him more 'wolfy' (the string of Green Stuff round his neck is going to be his Wolf Tooth Necklace), but on the whole I'm pleased with how he's shaping up so far. By the way, in case you're wondering his claws were made from DE Corsair blades and smoothed out with liquid Green Stuff (an awesome product).

Let me know what you guys think

A new saga begins...

So begins the tale of Wolf Lord Rylak Foestrider and the Great Company of Tra...

After months of proxying lists and fine-tuning my army composition, i have finally started building my Space Wolves force properly, seeing as it's been in the works ever since the latest codex came out.

Each and every model will have its own name and backstory, which I'll present to you when I post them up, along with their ongoing sagas (to be added to after particularly spectacular feats in-game)

I'm really excited about this project and I aim to have it finished by about June-July time next year, just in time to enter them into next years Armies on Parade at GD UK 2012.

So here's what I've been building so far...


Olyek Dragonfoe, my Rune Priest, based off the Forge World Boarding Marine and various SW bits, with the spear shaft coming from a chaos knight



Baldric Greymane, slayer of the Bloodtithe and member of the Grey Hunter pack 'The White Wolves'.


I painted guy this a while back as a tester model, but I'm not really happy with the way his armour turned out. I've still yet to find a nice grey recipe that works for my wolves. If anyone's got a good one, let me know.

And finally, we have Alrik Thunderslayer, a member of another of my Grey Hunter packs.



I love the old mk's of power armour and will be using them in combination with the SW bitz pack throughout my force, not quite making them pre-heresy, but having that sort of vibe.

So what do you guys think so far?

Next time I should have some pics of my Bjorn and Thunderwolves ready to show you

Post Games Day Recovery

Games Day made me ill.

It always does. I don't know what it is about it, whether it's the 10,000 geeks packed into the same space, the constant noise or my usual all-nighter the day before, but it does. My voice went round about 11am Sunday and still hasn't returned and i've got the flue from hell.

I lost yesterday completely, falling asleep as soon as I got back 10pm Sunday night and waking up 11am this morning. Not good, especially as I was due in Uni yesterday.

But all in all it was worth it. Yeah, i know people complained about the queues, but as long as you weren't fussy what time of day you got your stuff, it wasn't so bad.

I managed to bag the following




- Forgeworld Boarding Marine

- Contemptor Dreadnought with Kheres-Pattern Assault Cannon and Power Fist

- Salvations Reach, unsigned unfortunately, due to the queues, but a damn good read nonetheless. I've been forcing myself to keep putting it down to get some uni work done.

- The Outcast Dead, again unsigned.

- and finally, a single Scout Marine from the Rites of Initiation. Rather handy, as I've been trying to work out the best way to make my Wolf Scout with Mark of the Wulfen without having to buy an entire Scouts box


I also struck up a few interesting conversations. I went to the Warseer meet-up, saw Harry and co. They seem nice sorts, but i mainly ended up talking to the guy who goes by the name ChaosAstartes about the nature of Khorne and martial honour.

I also went out to smoke and got chatting to a fellow Space Wolves player about Thunderwolves conversions (Bloodcrushers are the way to go!) and the Sons of Russ in general.

Plus I got to be sarcastic to Matt Ward and STILL get his autograph

So all in all I'd rate this Games Day 7/10. Next time GW, sort the queues!

Right now GD's out the way, back to my projects. My question to you is, where next? Thousand Sons or Space Wolves?

Ok on the coach on the way back from GD UK. So the plan for pics completely backfired. The camera packed up the moment I went to take a picture of that gorgeous drop pod outside. Instead i will try and put together my recollections.

- First of all I spoke to Jervis Johnson. We had a talk about the lack of army-specific magic items in 8th ed fantasy and he said it was to make it easier to control balance between army books. I tactfully 'forgot' to mention the Ogre Kingdoms Hellheart

- Next was Matt Ward. I tried subtle sarcasm by say 'I really like how you've made the most elite army in 40k even more powerful and elite'. Either he's used to this kind of thing or it went way over his head. I would've spoke to more of the team but a crowd was building by then and i wanted to beat the scrum to Forge World.

- Both new Forgeworld and Warhammer Forge books were on display, with IA11 featuring guard and Space Wolves fighting Eldar. there's a range of Eldar Corsair army lists to draw your army list from, including the Shadow Spectres.

Bram Redmaw is being released. A rather taSty model i must say, but they kept pretty tight lipped about the possiblity of further releases, namely Thunderwolves. They claimed anything from maybe to not even in the distant pipeline, depending on the designer I spoek to. The GW design team kept mysteriously quiet about this too, almost like they weren't allowed to say anything...

- Warhammer Forge was interesting. Apparently they're going to focus on the 'tech and cogs' side of things, being more interested in magic and beasts.

- There will be Elementals for all main BRB lores. For now they're keeping them as bound monsters for Storm of Magic, mainly because of worries of balance and points-cost issues if they had wizards being able to summon them in normal games.

The Fire one will be a pillar of flame with dragons coming out the top and the Metal one will be an orb of metal with carvinal mask-esque faces coming out of it

- No Dark Elf stuff is planned at Warhammer Forge, as they've yet to have an inspiring-enough idea for them

- Warlord Titans are a definate possibility, with the new Phantom Titan being about as tall as a Warlord would be

- The queue for sales was ridiculously long, with Forgeworld, Black Library and mainstream GW sales being crammed into a tiny area, resulting in extreme congetsion, with people queuing through the gaming area and waits of over two hours to buy anything. GW, if you're reading, bad call...

- No mention of future releases from GW, nothing was even forthcoming about next months releases

- There was however a massive WoTR display board witht he Battle of Five Armies. Interestingly, there was an unfamiliar Bear model on one corner of the board (future Beorn release anyone?)

- Specialist Games models and Rulebooks were on sale for the first time at GW that i can remember in my three years of attending Games Day

Right, I'm going to get some sleep. I'll post more as it occurs to me

Degrees of 'counts as' - Being reasonable?

Played two games today. One in the ongoing WHFB league i'm in and the other with the space wolf list today. Lost horribly in both cases, but i didn't mind too much. But the second game threw up issues of 'counts as' and reasonability.

Basically, we both wanted to test the new space wolves codex. Neither of us own the 'official' models, so there was a lot of 'counts as' being used.

First up, he put a Black Reach captain, a Terminator Chaplain and a Dreadnought down and said 'that's A Wolf Lord, A Rune Priest and Bjorn'. Now i'm a reasonable guy (not that i'm saying he's not), so i said, yeah, no Problem.

I then unpacked my stuff and put Sarpedon and Tellos down and said "That's Njal and a Wolf Lord". Instantly, he blurted out, pointing to Sarpedon "but he's on too big a base, you can't use him!", followed by a retort from me. I'd been using this guy for months as Tigerius (who's on a small base), with no problems, yet the moment i wanted to use him as a new character, (who is more or less the equivilant of Tigerius, but sold on a terminator base), it was apparently bang out of order, just because he had some apparently powerful special rules, which had yet to be run through the local gaming mill, so the hype over them was still believed.

However, in his new-codex-oh-my-god-it's-overpowered, he chose to ignore the fact that Tellos, my Wolf Lord, for exactly the same fluff reasons as Sarpedon, had chainblades for hands(count-as wolf claws), no chest armour (but highly mutated, so counting as runic armour and belt of russ) and no representation of the jump pack i gave him (inhuman speed). If i'd wanted to make an overpowered list, i could have classed Tellos as Canis Wolfborn, who is very Tellos-like, in that he's also fast, tough and kick-ass in combat.

It's not like i was wanting to gain an unfair advantage by using Sarpedon on a bigger base, i was merely wanting to represent one of my favourite BL characters in a fluffy manner, as well as make use of the model i'd commissioned off Ron.

If i'd really wanted to be picky, i'd have said in that case, he couldn't use his Chaplain as a Rune Priest, but instead i took the cowards way out and bargained with him. I let him use his missile launchers from his tactical squads (being thrust into the role of grey hunters) as plasma guns in exchange for him 'being reasonable' about Sarpedon. In the end, Sarpedon was vapourised by a lascannon with the opening shot of the game and those extra plasma guns cost me the match, taking out my drop pod troops as they landed. The game was over by turn three.

I wouldn't have even been bothered that much if his force hadn't consisted of a mis-match of several other SM armies, including Dark Angels and Codex Marines, with no consistancy of colouration, whereas, i'd taken the time to paint every model in Soul Drinkers colours and model things like Mark of the Wulfen clearly (mutations). The only reason why Sarpedon isn't on a terminator base is because when building him, Ron suggested that he'd look better on a bigger base, else he'd look ridiculously squashed in on a 40mm one.

Speaking to Colin, the club organiser afterwards, he said it was a little unfair considering it was a friendly game and if he was in that position he would have let me use Sarpedon without forcing concessions upon me. But unfortunately there is a fair sprinkling of competitve players in my local gaming group, whereas me and Colin are more in favour of balanced or fluffy lists, so there's often clahes of 'gaming personalities'

So, who would you favour in this situation. Me or him?

How far should people reasonably take 'counts as'?

Soul Drinker SW list 1

Here's the first draft of my Soul Drinkers SW list. No idea how it'll play yet, but i'm hoping it's going to be fast and hard hitting, with Tellos and his Assault Marines spearheading the charge. I've deliberately restricted the Mark of the Wulfen to the Skyclaws, to represent the fact that the worst mutated marines would be sent forward in search of a glorious death.


Commander Sarpedon - counts as Njal Stormcaller

Sergeant Tellos
Wolf Lord with Twin Lightning claws, Jump Pack (representing his inhuman speed), Runic Armour, Belt of Russ, Saga of the Warrior Born and Wolf Tooth Necklace.


Chaplain Iktinos

Wolf Priest with Saga of the Beastslayer and Wolf Tooth Necklace


Iktinos 'Flock' - Blood Claw Pack

9 warriors, meltagun, Powerfist, Plasma pistol

Drop Pod with Deathwind


Squad Zeon - Grey Hunters

9 men, plasma gun, power weapon

Drop Pod with Deathwind


Squad Luko - Grey Hunters

10 men, 2x meltagun, Power weapon

Drop Pod with Deathwind


Squad Tellos - Skyclaws

10 men, plasma pistol, power fist, mark of wulfen


Squad Greavus - Skyclaws

10 men, plasma pistol, power weapon, mark of wulfen


Squad Eumenes - Wolf Scouts

5 men, Boltguns, melta bombs, meltagun, 2 x power weapons


Squad Rilke - Wolf Scouts

5 men, sniper rifles


Squad Nisryus - Long Fangs

4 men - 2 x missile launchers, 1 x multi-melta

Note: Pack Leader in the Long Fangs represents the pre-cog psyker, Nisryus who's directing the chapter's few heavy weapons to where he predicts they're needed.

Still trying to work out how to fit Captain Luko and Techmarine Lygris in there, but for now i'm happy with this. All i need to buy are a few more Assault Marines to convert into Iktinos 'Flock'

Space Wolves for the right reasons?

Having bought and looked through the new SW codex, i've decided to collect a small contingent of space wolves to accompany my Soul Drinkers force. It won't be huge force, just enough for me to have fun with it. But i plan to use the SW codex in a few games.

Many may say i'm jumping on the bandwagon here, but i'm no powergamer or army junky, so i don't care.

These are the main 3 reasons behind my decision:

1. Epic models.

I love the new space wolves sprue that's come out. So many modelling possibilities have opened up it's unbeliveable. I plan to get a few of the basic SW boxes to make a few squads Blood Claws and a Wolf Lord at the very least. I'll probably make a lone wolf too, but in general, SW's will feed my love of making character models like no other amry will.

Plus, i reckon a few SW heads scattered through my IG army will look awesome.


2. Fluffy Soul Drinkers.

So many options in the SW book are just perfect for representing many of the unique things in the Soul Drinkers books,something my Raven Guard-based Soul Drinkers have struggled with. eg. Njal and his Lord of Tempests ability is just perfect for representing the effects of Sarpedons 'The Hell' psychic power, whereas before, i've had to make do with a 'count as' Tigerius since the loss of Fear of the Darkness from the SM list

Also, a Wolf lord with twin lightning claws and saga of the warrior born just screams the name Tellos at me. Maybe even the Mark of the Wulfen instead. Eithe rof these two would convey the 'frenzied killing machine with chainsaw hands' thing he's got going on.

Only downside to this idea is that assault squads are only ws and bs 3, but that shouldn't be too much of a problem, with their +2 attacks on the charge making up for it.

3. Play style.

I play very gung ho with SM's anyway, often favouring glorious charges and creating epic combats, when i really should be focussing on objectives. With this in mind, the army i envisage me having at the moment is an army based around blood claws, impeteous and foolhardy, out to prove themselves and start their sagas with a bang. I'm aiming to avoid any really cheesy or broken choices/ combinations in my list (so no Wolfwing, Thunderwolf Cavalry, etc), as i know many players who are starting SW's just for the chance to use this stuff, which smacks of powergaming.

So, as you can see. I have very valid reasons for wanting to start SW's, other than just 'because they're new'. I've wanted to do them for years, ever since i saw the 13th company in the EoT campaign, but various other projects kept getting in the way.

What do people think?

Have I chosen SW's for the right reason, or do you think i'm just another army junky latching onto the latest thing.