Tales of a hobby butterfly

This week I have mostly been sticking 6mm deathkorps to metal washers.

These models are from vanguard miniatures, I’m amazed how much detail they fit on such tiny models.

The army so far, I’m going to be using the epic armageddon uk rules.

When I find my old reaver titan this should be 3000 points, just need to finish putting filler on the bases then splash on some paint. Hopefully I can get 1000 points painted  before another shiny thing takes my eye, at least that way I can try the minigeddon rules whilst I get the rest of the force painted.

Cheapest bases i could find were metal washers from wilco you can get as many as you can fit in a bag for 3 quid so i now have enough 25 mm and 38 mm bases to last a life time, plus they can be stuck to magnetic sheet which helps with sorage.

I find cheap filler is great for hiding the puddle bases on the figures a bit of fine sand and glue hides any edges I miss. I was finding that the filler chips a bit when used so fixed that by adding  a layer of mode podge to the bases then letting it dry fully before painting.

The local gaming club is planning a day of 500 point kings if war games to get new players into the game.

I have not played kow before but really enjoy warhammer fantasy so thought I would make a force up to have a go.

I do have a halfling ambush but am going to save that for another day as I liked the idea of the kingdom of men army, old school humans vs the masses of daemons and fantasy creatures is always cool.

Hunted through the pile of shame and found some half painted empire spearmen, a pile of 3d printed great swords, some empire handgunners and some halflings on gryphounds I built for an age of sigmar army that never happened.

This should make a force with good close combat units, a bit if shooting and cavelry of sorts which will give me a good overview of the rules.

The last couple of weeks the butterfly has landed squarely on the horus heresy.

Last year I printed load of marines and shoulder pads for the plastic chaps as well as reconditioned an old broken rogue trader landraider. Then put them in a Box, now it’s time to get some paint on them

I wanted a quick and easy scheme so after lots of Web surfing I followed the mid winter minis tutorial.

Base them in black, cover in vallejo royal purple, dry brush with royal purple mixed 50/50 with said pink then paint light grey on tubes and leg wrinkly bits, dark metal on the weapons, paint the gold bits. Paint the base khaki, once dry cover everything in a 50/50 mix of army painter strong tone and water then leave over night to dry.

The final bits to do are to edge highlite with squid pink, some bright silver to highlite the gold, dry brush the base with khaki then ushabti bone, paint the base edge black and bam job done

This model had been through the wars the last cannons were broken off so I had to pin them and stick them back on, there was a big hole in the side so I stuck some card on the inside then skimed with milliput, the front had a bit missing and had glue damage so I put a plasticard cover over it, this looked a bit plain for the emperors children.

After looking through the horus heresy art book for inspiration I thought a swish shiny eagle would look good on the front as in the fluff I think that  they are the only chapter that can  wear it at that time.

To start I made the basic shape with thin card then stuck it on the front. The symbol was then built up a layer at a time with fine white milliput and lots of swearing when I squishe it multiple times with my clumsy ham fists

These dudes are 20mm figures from the platoon 20 Arvn range and some of the brittania miniatures Us specisl forces range

the platoon 20 sculpts are awesome and have loads of detail.
This smaller scale is great to be  able to get a whole squad completed quickly before i zoom off to another project

So on sunday i visited the local gameing club in illford to play and loose my 4th ever game of saga.

my normans took a swift beating from a force of viking raiders i woukd like to say the dice were against me but it was more down to poor generalship on my part and a rather gung ho attitude for my cavelry.

however a game of horus heresy was also being run and it looked awesome which reminded me i had a pile of sprues and 3d prints that were ment to be built a while ago.

so when i got home i plundered the pile of shame and found about 2000 points of bits that should make a good force. The bits origionaly started as emperors children then before i painted them they became world eaters so i printed some land raider doirs and pads, before deciding green would look cooler so restarted the army as sons of horus. After trying to find a green i liked which took a long time and was mostly me painting a model to find out i had painted it brown or grey and not green (being colour blind is fun)i kind of gave up so had a box that had bits of three chapters but not enough for one army on its own.

so today i spent my day off pulling bits off and sticking things together to remake them as the emperors children they started as…..

This week has mostly been a week of painting muddy troops.

i tried undercoating in brown for a change then drybrushing lighter browns and khaki before washing with strong tone from army painter. Once that was dry i went back over the uniforms with some greens to add some colour and a dull metallic for the metal bits.

i need to decide on a colour for the bases and may look into a way to create a wet mud finish to add to the look of the force.

had a day off from work on sunday and having moved home last week wanted to explore the area with my other galf so we went on an adventure to check out the illford gaming club, which was time well spent. Met a group of like minded people and should have some new saga opponents as well as other games. Had a chat about turnip 28 and saw the project on xlbs now i have the turnip bug. This is great as it will use up some 28 mm napoleonics that i had sitting around. They were ment for sharp practice but half way through collecting the armies i decided to build them in 18mm miniatures rather than 28mm which is cool but left lots of figures in the shame pile but now they haveba new muddy home in turnip 28.

The first force im working on will be a standard force organisation rather than following a cult.

It will be made up of a single toff with two toadys allowing four units of followers, i chose to convert up a unit of fodder armed with black powder weapons, kind of wanted to model them with pikes but as this is ment to be reducing the shame pile i went with what i had. These will be converted from british line infantry

one unit of brutes with black powder weapons made from some french dragoons.

i kind of fancied a cannon so the next unit is a stump gun.

the last unit in the force will be cavelry in the form of three bastsrds eith melee wespons. The cavelry will be made using some cold ones from the shame pile and milliput and green stiff to make them odd.

time to get converting

Among other things this week i managed to complete the scratch built war waggon putting the final unit into my empire mercenarie force.

i would usually have just bought an stl and printed out a unit like the war wagon but dont think it would have fitted into the okd school vibe of the army. So collected bits and bobs from my bits box and started cutting and sticking and ended up with my own version of the model as close as i can get without spending silly money on ebay and at the same time reducing the shame pile.

I kind if fancied adding some empire sllies/mercenaries to my dwarf army,I have always liked the empire war waggon model but dont have the dosh to afford ebays crazy prices so thought i would have a go at making my own from scratch. The old mail order pictures turn out to be one to one size so i traced  them off and made some templates.

the empire mercenaries are from a kick starter oakbound studios did last year and The dudes on horses are from the old battle master game. I think the knights with a single plume on their hat are dupposed to be brettonians but i think with empire style horses they fit in pretty well.

The mercenaries in base colours ready for a splash of army painter strong tone

The war wagon is mainly built out of cerial box card, match stivks and coffee stirrers liberated from greggs in the great late 2022 swizzle stick heist.

luckily the old plastic sheilds that came in an old warhamner starter box matched the sheilds on the front and back of the origional. The eagle heads on the corners i think came from a 40k imperial knight kit.

to make the tiles on the sides i just layered small squares of card then coated them in watery pva to keep them in place, the rivitd are pin heads glued intk s hole. The horses are old empire horses that need serious tlc and green stuff.

i have one of the origional crew with the big ball and chain that came in an ebay purchase as a bonus but is missing a leg so needs some green stuff. The rest of the crew will need to be converted using ofds  and ends from the bits box of doom.

Was very lucky to win a mantic halfling ambush set in a raffle at salute  on the paint all the minis stand, so really want to start on these dudes as well as continuing with epic stuff and a healthy dose of nam minis that i picked up from gringo40s as well as some of the rubicon that i thought i would pick up as shiny syndrome took over.

i think i will base the halflings up on seperate 20mm bases so i can try kings of war and still be able to use them in my warhammer empire army as well.

This flame cannon has been on my to do list for a while as part of the crown of command army painting challenge. Finishing this has removed quite a lump from my pile of shame

its a strange feeling completing an army that has been unpainted metal and plastic for so long.

i guess an army is never truly finished as i have plans to work on a scratch built empire war waggon and some empire mercenaries that i got earlier in the year from the oakbound studio kick starter.

This week i have still been working through my epic pile of shame as well as spending a bit of time on a dwarf flame cannon and crew.

i have tried to get as much done as possible as i am in the middle of moving so am not always sure where some of my stuff is, and its salute next weekend so wont have much time for painting but will probably be adding to the pile of shame and not removing it.

Turns out my head was turned by the glint of shiny beskar.

like a lot of people i have been watching the mandalorion recently and could not fail to notice the mando box nestled on top of my pile of shame.

i did not fancy painting it with metallic paint as it never quite looks right when i do it. So inbetween bading epic dudes and blue marines i gave non metallic metal a go on the starwars legion mando figure.

i followed a you tube video from sorastrose painting and am pretty pleased with the results for a first attempt, plus its another figure removed from the pile of shame before it grows again after salute.

painting this chap has made me look at the box of imperial assault figures that need finnishing i got half way through the core set before moving on to something else. I hear zeb and ezra calling out for some paint.

An evil sunz ork dreadnought and stompa ready to squish some out of luck guardsmen

and a load of dudes ready for some paint

Back in the day me and my brother used to fight huge battles on the living room carpet, with tiny space dudes. Reenacting the horus heresy before it was cool. Thoes 6mm marines were caked in enamel paints but we had fun.

the next edition came along giving young me acesss to eldar and orks, the marines got spruced up with a new coat of acrylic paint removing any detail they once.

then along came third edition with the funky long bases so you could finaly paint the dude in the centre.

this has left me with a box full of cool stuff alowing me to create multiple armys.

i quite fancy the epic 40k or 3rd edition rules as they let me use all the cool models with simple mechanics.

im going to start with an ork and guard army each at 1500 points which should give me two forces with 5-6 activations each that should be good for an afternoons gameing i can then either increase them in 500 point lumps or starr on the chaos or marine force, depending how the mood takes me. Althoug some zelot miniatures heroquest minis are peeping at me from the corner of my painting beuro

I know the bases should be square but i quite fancy the look of rounds plus it will annoy some people which is a bonus, bam ?

All the tiles and tokens are in the box but over the years the models have moved on to other projects or been lost in the pots of doom that are my bits boxes.

the plan is to 3d print and convert from parts i have  to create the miniatures i need to complete the game. I want to paint the models as bright as possable as i have nostalgia memorys of this game always looking far to bright compared to the silver and grey corridors in normal space crusade.

some of the models have been painted some from back when i was at school in the early 90s i want to keep these as they are but rebase them to fit in with the hive fleets bright colours.

the main game came with two squads of marine scouts and four tyranid warriors. I dont have these any more but with the help of my 3d printer i now have the warriors and with the help of the bits box i have a squad  of scouts i just need to decide on which chapter of marines they belong to im thinking either ultramarines as i quite fancy painting blue or as good old howling griffons so i can add them to my 2nd edition marine force.

This project is going to hopefully allow me to paint and play a game i have been meaning to finish for a long time. This game always came across as a cool half way house between a table top war game and a futuristic dungeon crawler with some roleplay elements. plus you get to play as super human marine dudes sent smashing in to a living space craft that was minding its own business in space, to destroy its vital organs including its sphincter whilst fighting off different organisms that are trying to eat your dudes or lay eggs in them, as well as trying to escape before it all goes pop destroying you all. The origional game came with limited models to use in the campaigns. but did include rules for using lots of other types of units in your games some of the models you come across in the hive ship are even useable as units that help the imperial players such as a squar or eldar prisoners that you can help to escape. My plan is to fill out as many units as possible using my bits box, and then play through a campaign of brave imperial forces attempting to flush away the foul xenos hive ships that are invading the Stercus system.

The game came with two squads of five scouts for the marine player. These have been lost many moons ago so i consulted the bits box of doom and found an old squad of scions i was converting using old catachan, marine scout  and mechanicus bits. I managed to cobble together a single squad and painted them up as ultramarine scouts.

I guess i need some more marines, i have terminators from space hulk that i can use but i fancied some good old school marines.

so i booted up my 3d printer and made two squads of five one squad has a rocket launcher the other has s las connon but will be used as a plasma gun.

i painted these with scale 75 artists paints which are awesome.

i also had a go at making a wet pallet from a food tub kitchen roll and baking parchment which worked surprisingly well