Collins Does Orktober

An old colleague sold me the assault on black reach Orks for the price of a pint because he simply didn’t want them. perfect! they went in the loft for ages and then I decided that yes, I would participate with Orktober, I don’t have any other projects on the go really. I then went to town searching for the other Ork models I loved from my childhood, mostly the super old gorkamorka trukks, wartrakks, buggies and warbikers. naturally bargains were had on eBay, especially using the vouchers I had from selling other toys.

Onto some cool artwork!

and then it all went to shit…

well its not that bad. I have been in a state of fluxx for a while, lockdown doesn’t affect my families professions except making them busier but sometimes we get posted or rather awarded jobs in different parts of the country which we vaguely had some control over (…ish, not really).

so my wife’s job moved and so I had to also move (I do like my wife, rare I know…), house went on the market, jobs changed and the move happened right in October…. so that’s why nobody ever saw anything posted then. we still aren’t in our new house due to lockdown 2.0 and are living in an odd way, but hey, such is life… just roll with the punches and remember to have a job now is better than to be furloughed or redundant.

To make myself feel better I backed the ADF imperial guardswomen on kickstarter to give the Orks something to face off against and also because I really liked the idea of them not all being Lara Croft tiny waist big boobed babes of death. I won’t be able to get these printed off or painted just like the orks because my printer is packed ready for the house move.

So, let’s break the objective down. For this I’ve gone back to an old old codex, well… 2007ish which is the one I could find that would cover the model types I want to paint/play with.

• Warboss (60), power klaw (25) and twin-linked shoota (5) = 90pts
• 5x Nobz (100), sluggas and big Choppas (25) = 125pts
•  20x Boyz (120), 18x slugga and shoota, 2x big shootas (10) = 130pts
• 3x Deffkoptas (105), 3x twin linked rokkit launcha (30) = 135pts

That’s 1 HQ, 1 elite, 1 (or 2) troops and 1 fast attack for 480pts

• 12x Warbikers (300), Nob (10) = 310pts
• 6x Warbuggies (180), 5x Wartrakk (25) 6x Red paint job (30), 1 Skorcha (10) = 245pts
• 4x Trukks (140), 4x red paint job (20) = 160pts
• 32x Boyz (192), slugga and choppa
• 12x Boyz (72), shootas

That totals 979points for 3 fast attack choices and 3 (ish) troops choices.

One of the coolest characters for me is Chief Ork Nob’ead Ghazghkull Thraka.

I honestly do not like his new mega model. I much prefer his 2000 era metal mega armoured self.

I didn’t want to spend £20-50 on him though as the point of this for me is to do it cheap and fun. in walks a random 3D file I happened to pick up a few months ago.

• Ghazghkull (225) = 225pts

If we add it all together we end up with an illegal list… but rules are meant to for ‘oomies and the only rule that matters to an Ork is be da tuffist and the fastierist Ork is da tuffierist of dem all coz he getz der furst!

• 2 HQ
• Ghazghkull (225) = 225pts
• Warboss (60), power klaw (25) and twin-linked shoota (5) = 90pts
• 1 Elite
• 5x Nobz (100), sluggas and big Choppas (25) = 125pts
• 4 Fast Attack (rulz breakin’)
• 3x Deffkoptas (105), 3x twin linked rokkit launcha (30) = 135pts
• 12x Warbikers (300), Nob (10) = 310pts
• 3x Warbuggies (90), 3x Wartrakk (15) 3x Red paint job (15) = 120pts
• 3x Warbuggies (90), 2x Wartrakk (10) 3x Red paint job (15), 1 Skorcha (10) = 125pts
• 5 Troops
• 12x Ork Boyz (72), sluggas and choppas, Ork Trukk (35), Red paint job (5) = 112pts
• 12x Ork Boyz (72), sluggas and choppas, Ork Trukk (35), Red paint job (5) = 112pts
• 12x Ork Boyz (72), sluggas and choppas, Ork Trukk (35), Red paint job (5) = 112pts
• 12x Ork Boyz (72), sluggas and choppas, Ork Trukk (35), Red paint job (5) = 112pts
• 16x Ork Boyz (96) 12x shootas, 4x choppas and sluggas, 2x big shootas (10) = 106 pts (rulz breakin’)
• Total Points = 1572

When I count it all up I get a reasonably cheap sum of £79.80 + £15 PnP

As the vehicles I like are all Gorkamorka era I also decided to buy the rule books for that game too, which added another £20.30 to the total.

So overall I got a Fast Horde Ork army for under £100 (£117.10 with old rulebooks).

Actually that’s more than I thought I had spent but still pretty cheap given the model count (96 models) that probably would have cost in the region of £550 if all bought from new today (with substitutions for OOP minis). Also I can justify it as part of the prehouse move tidying I sold a lot of minis and eBay gave me 10% returned value vouchers in return so my actual outgoing was was probably only £60 or so, or at least that’s what im going to tell myself as I also bought lots of force on force expansion books too.

I continue to find myself without a hobby space due to the move so I am turning my attention to planning the basing.

I have always done more realistic or real world basing for my models, usually green grass, bushes and flowers over a brown dirt or mud base. Occasionally a brown/yellow desert with dried grass to really spice life up.

With a 41st millennium project I can afford to go a bit more outlandish and alternative rather than basing it on reality.

I have been watching Lukes Geek Gaming Scenics videos for a while and really enjoy his content. with the release of the Indomitus box for 40k Luke released a new base ready product aimed squarely at the Necrons which he shamelessly plugged on his channel like any responsible store owner should do. People seem to get butt hurt by it but that’s probably because they are cretins needlessly stupid and entitled.

I liked what he did and will shamelessly copy it but here are some real world examples of this in action (minus the green and blue glass)

Given that I can go a bit poppy with the green and red from the Orks it might be good to have a subdued base and a black rim to frame it all in. I am wondering whether I should go with the green shards or find my own white ones to replicate those iceberg blocks from Iceland. Not sure how to get white ones though, maybe smash up some quartz.

I finally did a thing!

I decided I really liked the Iceland Diamond Beach images I saw. The chunks of ice just struck me as a cool thing and i’d never seen it before

I bought some of the volcanic island base ready from geek gaming and they also happened to have white glass / crystal shards which I couldn’t find before lockdown in my local general stores, garden centres and hobbyish shops.

I think the colour comes from coal or coke or something similar, not sure. if I had some I could put in a grinder I would definitely try and replicate it.

I now need to decide whether I base paint white to keep the bright under colour of the ‘ice’ to make it look like there is some reflective light or accept a duller look. I will do a second base with a white undercoat and see what occurs.

I noticed that after a few days the PVA completely dried out under the glass shards (duh! that’s what it’s meant to do!) and the whole aesthetic of the base completely changed.

No longer did I have bright shiny blocks of ice that captured and glowed with daylight like you would see in real life. I had dark, black semi shiny lumps of glass. they didn’t glow, they didn’t refract or reflect. They simply disappeared into the black sand of the base and were difficult to see or set the scene.

#disappointment

Here you can see what I mean. The glass disappears on the base. Specifically on the black rim base there is one razor sharp looking one at the front right (just in front of the big bit) that basically is invisible now.

I redid my test piece but instead of priming in black I primed in white. This means that when the glue dries the colour beneath shows through and it is still a bight colour that can help reflect the light back out.

As it happens I also quite like the idea of having a brilliant white rim too. only ever see those on truly snowy bases but it does help sell the idea that it is ice and not some mystical grim dark crystal, aka glass…

Ok so now i’m not sure what to paint the rim. should it be black or white?

The newest on the right was primed in white, then basing material added and then had the rim painted black. other than that they’re more or less the same.

Help me choose!

Having not quite decided on the basing but leaning to the white rim I started painting!

I decided to paint the shoota squad of orks. 12 models.

Out of the group of 12 I managed to salvage and clean up all 12. 0% wastage is a good result so far. As this is an eBay clean up job I am not sure I will keep it that high but we shall see…

ooo im still not sure about the basing rim colour!

also, the works aren’t as poppy as I want them to be. looks like I shall have to do the highlighting in a brighter colour than I first anticipated. moot green perhaps.

The speed painting I’m using here isn’t that speedy. I expect I am simply not cut out for it

I have also been thinking of what to do with the vehicles in this army too. I would quite like to do something special with them as the Boyz can get mightily dull.

During my research I found this old hobby lab, watch it and see if you can guess what I have planned. Also, please take the opportunity to force the OTT crew to do more of these, I quite liked them back in the day.

I have a number of war trakks that I want to use but I don’t want them all to look the same.

the easiest thing for me to do is add random panels and stuff. a simple classic look would be Schürzen or spaced armour commonly used on armoured vehicles but usually associated with Das Panzers.

In the above Hobby lab Lloyd and John make some terrain out of coffee cup holders and bog rolls. Cheap and easy to find in 2016, valuable commodities in  todays world of lockdown 3.0 2021.

Im not sure if I like it atm. half of me thinks that it is too big and should probably only be on the tracked section of the vehicle. it would leave the driver overly exposed but hey, Orks!

What do you think about the size?

I am yet to wreck it and make it Orky with bolted on bits and bobs etc

I decided that I was happy with the overall size of the spaced armour but I didn’t like the bottom and the lack of detail on them.

I went to town using some leather working equipment (specifically a hole punch) to create some bolt heads, added some bullet holes using a pin drill and then added orkish patch it up strips.

The main material used here is bog roll cardboard tube. not the strongest but when superglued together becomes quite tough. another pleasant side effect is that when it is drilled it gives it the appearance of being melted rather than drilled, the edges burr up. this side effect was captured/preserved by dabbing a little super glue in there. once painted it’ll look like a AP round has tried to drill its way through.

Not just the WarTrakks are getting the custom bitz n bobz treatment.

This evening I’ve done similar to a trukk to turn it into a semi dune buggy type thing crossed with a German ww2 lorry.

This was made with aluminium mesh (used for fixing cars) and strong garden wire bonded with superglue. The armour plates and tailgate were made from toilet roll and corrugated cardboard as the wartrakk was.

The canvas rolls were made from watery PVA and kitchen roll.

The only thing that’s hard with this is the bending of the wire. it takes patience and lots of test fitting. other than that, it is super simple really and currently still removable (to aide painting)

Ive now done the 6 (out of 5!) Nobz from the black reach set and the black reach warboss too.

I found an additional nob body but not enough heads and arms. ive been forced to use normal ork heads and arms to make a dodgy bonus nob. It’s like that weird ‘grab my strong hand’ from scary movie or scream or whatever it was back in the early 00’s

The warboss is the only model that I’ve done additional highlights. I went a shade of green lighter (skarsnik green) and actually did some highlights on the red clothing too rather than leaving it as a beige drybrush.

I think when I’ve done the army I might go back and do lots more highlights like on this warboss on all the other models. It really depends on how much steam I have left in me by the end of the horde.

So that’s 43 models painted out of 88 that I’ve managed to salvage so far. yes sadly there will be wastage. more on that when I get to the end of this army.

Solid 49% completed! whoop!

I got bored of painting so went back to a bit of scratch building. I sadly got carried away and didn’t take step by step photos but I do now have 4 unique trukks and 2 out 4 wartrakks customised.

Im pretty happy with this build result so far.

The WarTrakk seen here was one that was going to end up as wastage. it didn’t have a gunner or a gun but I remember back to the random Russian rocket trucks from WW2 and decided that it was suitably Orky and that the Ork would be mental enough to set it off whilst driving at full pelt towards the enemy… he doesn’t care about burning his face!

It was made using matches in 2 sizes and then the cardboard inner tube from a roll of dog poo bags. it looks a bit stubby and not so aerodynamic but I plan to paint an evil sunz face on the front of it to disguise my lack of ability to make a dome. I may also add random panels and bolts to the rocket too so it looks more ramshackle.

I have been procrastinating from painting more orks. I still have 20 Boyz to do and I am not looking forward to batch painting again… I already did like a million of them.

Anyway, I broke out the cardboard and superglue to add a bit more character to some more wartrakks. I also found a complete set or scorcha metal parts and driver too so managed to recover another vehicle from the wastage pile!

What a slog that has been. nearly two weeks to paint these 24 Ork Boyz.

Some serious lack of motivation for them was encountered and I am now seriously doubting whether I will go back and do the additional layer of highlights I said I would do. I simply do not relish the opportunity to do it on 60 models when there are far more interesting things to do!

things like

• paint 10 warbikers
• paint 3 deathcopters
• add cardboard to a wartrakk
• paint 4 custom trukks
• paint 4 custom wartrakks
• paint a scortcha buggy and a custom wartrakk scortcha
• paint the ghost of ghazghull past
• strip the real ghazghull and then paint him. (oh yeah, I forgot to tell you, I picked one up for a tenner)

So still plenty to do! 25 models in fact

but first I must varnish and base these Boyz before I can truly call them done.

Ok so my whining about how much I hated painting them was a bit premature.

yes it wasn’t fun but really it was quite quick. remember my objective is tabletop standard not golden deamon winning.

these meet tabletop standard so this is a win.

Also I’ve realised that the Halfords base red primer I have is not a colour I have in citadel model paint. so currently they do not match my models red (mephiston) which is a bit pants but I’ll live with it.