Hey guys!
So I've been busy with a lot of things lately, but I've still been painting away! Lets just jump right into everything, shall we?
Astral Claws are definitely an interesting paint scheme; its kinda a trick trying to balance the overabundance of silver with gold and blue. A Tactical Squad and a rhino are a nice chance to practice how to achieve this on an army, because you'll be able to walk into units like scouts, command squads, or even terminators, knowing exactly what you need to do. But I digress; less talking, more pictures!
I managed to get my hands on an old Assault on Black Reach set for cheap; there's a dreadnought coming soon as well. All that's technically left to do is transfers on their shoulderpads, but I haven't ordered them from Forge World just yet.
The sergeant allowed for skintone practice, as well as a refresher on painting transition power swords by hand. As soon as I get my airbrush up and running, it'll be a million times easier!
I opted for turquoise eyes to really make them pop out from the silver. It even stands out from the standard blue of their shoulderpads! The plasma in the army will be the same color.
The missile launcher has a minor addition; an imperial guard rocket was clipped and glued into the barrel of the launcher. A little paint, and voila! An ugly gap was removed and some extra detail added!
'Astral Claws forces move into position against Fire Hawks early in the Badab Conflict.'
That leads me to my second project: The Badab War. 40k tournaments have had poor turnout in the FLGS I work at and, as a result, I'm done running them for now. I figured I could drum up more interest by running a narrative campaign, something that would encourage painting, modelling, and gaming from our gaming group. Enter The Badab War!
I'm running the campaign from Imperial Armour 9 and 10, as a simple groundwork to grow from. If this is a major success, I'll run a more generic campaign that allows more flexibility in forces. I've been pretty lenient with Space Marine forces though; the Howling Griffons player is running Dark Angels, while the Executioners is a Space Wolves player. The campaign is run in monthly escalation groups; month 1 is 400 point combat patrol. As we continue, the next wave will be 800 points, then 1k, then 1250, 1500, 1750, and finally 2000. The campaign will round out with an Apocalypse game as Lufgt Huron and Secessionist forces fight to defend the Palace of Thorns on Badab Prime! A stirring end to a great campaign! The small increments allow for gradual increases in forces, while allowing people to paint and game at their leisure across the course of the month.
Awards will also be given out at the end of the campaign for various achievements; Best Painted, Best General, as well as Godslayer; whoever kills the most Marines over the course of the campaign, and Bane of the Machine God; the player who captures the most vehicles over the course of the campaign.
As for Chapters, we have represented:
Seccessionists
Astral Claws
Mantis Warriors
Lamenters
Executioners
Badab PDF; The Tyrant's Legion
Loyalists
Howling Griffons
Minotaurs
Sons of Medusa
Star Phantoms
Raptors
I'll attempt to upload pictures of everyone's army as we play and progress through the story. Hopefully the campaign doesn't putter out early, but everyone seems excited and ready to play! Myself, I'm playing the Minotaurs first, hoping to get some Zone Mortalis in for game 1, but we'll see.
Alrighty, next up are some High Elf cavalry attachments, along with some Malifaux and terrain!
Back to painting!
Granesh