Finished Hans, Future Plans

Ready for action, but still needs detailing.

I got a wee bit of varnishing in on Tuesday before the Snowquester hit, or missed, yesterday.  Since I didn't ballast the Ravenwing bases on Monday night the spraying was confined to a pair of Hans arms, but now I can field at least one (almost) fully painted walker for my Axis troops.  As I've probably noted before it still needs numbers/icons and basing, but it's as finished as my infantry is.  Despite having it be dry for about two days I haven't actually put a finished trooper next to the finished walker yet, but I'm confident they'll be consistent with each other.

I Like New Paint

Must have picture for post, even bad picture.

Gearing up for some Dark Angels painting in the near future showed a couple holes in my paint collection, namely a step between Dark Angels Green and Goblin Green and a better shade for Bleached Bone.  I visited the only local shop that carries Vallejo Game Colors, Victory Comics, so I could get painting without having to wait for a delivery.  I found paint, namely Scurvy Green and Khaki, but did I find answers?

Let's start with the good news: Khaki is exactly what I was looking for.  It appears to be just a darker Bleached Bone, more or less, which is all I wanted it to be.  Went on easy over my dark grey primer, looked nice when finished.  Very pleased. 

Striking While the Iron Isn't Humid

Not pictured: the author.

The weather over the past few months has been less than acceptable for spraying, so when a window of warmish (for the season) and reasonably dry weather opens it's best to take advantage of it.  I did just that today by varnishing the zombies and Hans torso that have been on the painting table for far too long, priming four Terminators and a Tactical Marine that come from EV's recently acquired Dark Vengeance, and priming/basecoating a full Wotan and a medium walker torso.  I considered arms for the medium for a bit but couldn't settle on either Luther or Ludwig arms while the Lothar arms won't be camo and thus need no spraying.  As if all that wasn't enough I also sullied myself by going into an actual GW to poke around at their Dark Angel stuff, namely FoC unlocking characters and direct order bits.  In case you're like me and have avoided GWs like the plague you'll be glad to know that it hasn't been for nothing.  The full court sales press is still on and even having an obviously disinterested party along for the ride is no deterrent.  I did confirm that I could get direct order only stuff (looking at you Chapter specific upgrade sprues) shipped to the store while also avoiding S&H charges, so my suicide mission was successful.  I will need to shower for the next 72 hours, continuously, to feel normal again though.

I'm Still Not Dead

With all the rest gone, my new reason to watch TV.

I blame my complete lack of painting over the past month or two for the similar lack of blog content.  Fingers are crossed that the trend reverses in the near future.  For now some more sister kissing in the form of bullet points.

• New projects on the horizon because I don't have enough on my plate as it is.  First up is IKRPG minis.  I have a reasonably ambitious plan that involves (currently) four models for a single character.  Some bits are still en route, and I need to do some scuplting/converting on most of them, but one is ready for priming.  While I won't get any actual work in on it before tomorrow night's session I'll be able to start chipping away afterwards, and with any luck I'll have the first one finished (or well begun) by the time the bits for the rest arrive.
• New project number two is the return of 40k.  EV surprised me a few days ago by saying he'd be picking up Dark Vengeance soon.  This means that an expansion into Dark Angels is back on the table.  EV ran some numbers through Army Builder for me and it looks like two DVs worth of troops, plus am odd squad or two of marines that any GW enthusiast is likely to have lying around, will yield a decent sized army.  Even better, said army doesn't sound horrible on paper.  I'll be putting some or all of my remaining Christmas bounty into DV and a DA codex, plus whatever other odds and ends catch my eye.  I've already started (literally) dusting off some of the extra tactical marines from AoBR and imagining how they'll look in dark green.
• My winnings from Huzzah's first Dust tournament got reinvested in the form of Laser Grenadiers and another box of spotters/snipers.  I tried out the new stuff (except the second squad of spotters) last week.  I like three sets of snipers.  The lasers...maybe they'll work better when I build a list they fit into better.  

Big news on the Dust front, enough to warrant a non-bullet finish.  There will be three (3) regional tournaments within driving distance of the DMV.  First up is at Huzzah on April 6th, then the next week at Games and Stuff on the 14th, and finally out in West Virginia on May 26th.   Details are still sparse, plus Huzzah and GNS should both have moved/expanded between now and then, but it's great news that there are so many events in my "local" area.  Looks like hockey won't be interfering either.  While I'm not familiar with Your Hobby Place, the WV venue, it doesn't look to be much further out than GNS, plus they mention the game that got left behind (Uncharted Seas) on their site.

Next time: hobby progress.  I hope.

I Should Really Post More

My posting volume has gone way down lately.  To remedy this, at least in part, here's a list of stuff (other than posting) that I've been up to lately:

• Got a bad start on painting some Axis Soldier 3 units.   More on this later when they're painted up.
• Officially wrapped up the escalation/intro Dust league at Huzzah.  My spoils for victory?  The Axis heroes box.
• Won the first Dust tournament, also at Huzzah, with another epic showdown for supremacy with EV.  This match was better than our last, but still not entirely satisfying.  I haven't figured out what the spoils for this victory will be just yet, but I'm leaning towards the Axis heavy walker or waiting until the new zombies start coming out.
• Finally read the Dreadball book.  As a follow up, I opened one sack of components and started cleaning some models.  Dust has spoiled me with their already assembled and primed offerings.  The plan now is to paint them Right, taking time and doing details.  All the stuff I've gotten away from recently.  The problem there is that if I want to pimp the game around to draw in suckers players then I need to have a set ready to go, but if I paint them Right then they won't be ready to go until sometime in Q4 2015. 
• Collected the Gargossal I won in the Journeyman league last year.  I went with the Conquest.  Construction has yet to begin.
• Played a game of X-Wing with EV.  My spatial reasoning/anticipation leaves a lot to be desired.  
• The big culprit has been books.  Over the last month or so I've read the 10 Black Company books (all in a row, which is unusual for me) along with the final Wheel of Time book.  I've been knee deep in WoT for better than half my life and it's beyond odd to know that the series is wrapped up.
• I've stepped up to and backed (slightly) away from the Dark Angels cliff.  I got a lot of gaming gift certificates for Christmas and have been pondering using them, at least in part, on some DAs.  I still want to do a Terminator army and hope that Deathwing might do it more to my taste than Grey Knights, and I've wanted to do a biker heavy army for a while so why not do them both at once?  There are a couple problems with this idea, but I'll stick to two for now.  First is that I haven't actually played 40k in a while.  EV and I have pivoted to Dust of late and I don't know that I want to wade into looking for 40k games at a store.  Second is, unsurprisingly, money.  Since I don't have the 6th edition book yet I'd be looking at ~$140 between the starter box and the DA codex.  That's a higher hurdle than I want to jump to scratch a collecting/painting itch, especially considering how much my painting output has dropped.  I got burned by GKs not being what I wanted them to be, so I'll try the longer approach to DAs.  That said, the 6th edition box is still on the short list.
• Hockey also returned after a long absence.

 Why not add on some goals for this year while I'm at it?  On the painting front I want to do all the Axis, Conquest, a Dreadball team or three, all the Khador infantry, all the Legion beasts, and at least some of the remaining bits of both those factions.  Construction-wise I want to get the Stormraven together in particular and assemble all the stuff that's been hiding in boxes for far too long.  And get back to posting more as well.  Can't hurt to aim high, right?

Paint ALL the Models

Not a bad result for a day spent painting.

Let's be honest from the start: the subject line is a bit of an exaggeration.  But only a bit. 

I've been tiptoeing around painting my Axis for a while, spending plenty of time considering my approach, working on a test model here and there, but by no means making use of the time saving techniques I've theoretically been honing.  Today that finally changed.  After a bit of inspired late night gluing in Friday's wee hours I jumped in with both feet, slathering paint on anything within reach.  That tally is as such:

• Kommandotrupp with optional radioman
• Snipers
• Battle Grenadiers with extra Panzershreck
• Sturmpionere with optional radioman
• Two squads of zombies, still in progress
• Some dabbling with the test Hans (not pictured)

With the newly painted soldier 2 units it should be less of a struggle to figure out what models go in which squad (or how many Panzerfausts go in each squad).  I'll also be able to field at least some painted models, which will be a nice change of pace.  I've been spoiled by my past Journeyman efforts that let me take most any Legion model I have assembled while fielding only painted models.  The good news is that painting went about as quick as expected, so once I clear the final remaining hurdle of how to tackle the soldier 3 units then things should wrap up in short order.  The walkers will need a little extra attention, but they'd get that anyway since they're so big.  Now I just have to hope that the weather on Monday allows for varnishing.

Further Adventures in Painting Dust

Today's entry comes from the making lemonade file.  My weekly game with EV was pushed back from Tuesday to Friday to accommodate the new year.  Then the dastardly forces of Real Life converged to make our available window too small to game in.  Instead of moping about I forged on with hobby-related activities, namely getting stuff painted.

Step one: tape it up.

Since my previous experiment painting Axis infantry, I've managed to get exactly nothing finished.  Or started for that matter.  While I'm happy with the planned approach to painting Soldier 2 infantry, Soldier 3 is a hurdle yet to be cleared (what to do about all the armor), and there's also the small matter of walkers that need to be painted.  (As a side note, last week I took a hair dryer to my various bits of plastic and got them all as straight as they're going to get, so I'm running low on excuses to dodge painting.)  I'd picked up some painters tape a while back to try an idea for doing walkers, and today the weather warmed up enough that I felt comfortable giving it a shot.  I've pulled inspiration from the Cerberus camo found here.  The first step was simple: mask off spots that would end up the darkest.  Since the models come "pre-primed," and since I'd incorporated that "primer" into the Soldier 2 scheme, the stock grey forms the darkest, bottom layer of paint.  After taping I took a can of light grey spray to the entire model.

Axis Infantry Painted

The sniper's shoulder isn't really yellow, it's just a reflection.

Big day for the Axis cause: frequently-used models have been painted.  The gorillas I did a few weeks ago were selected because they don't find a place in many lists, so if they took longer than expected it wouldn't cause (m)any problems.  Today I took a bigger leap by tackling a unit of snipers, along with a unit of the recently intriguing spotters, both of which have featured in every list I've run since getting the Hades book.  I wanted to take a bigger bite since I felt confident in my at the time untested scheme, but was restrained by my lack of prior preparation.  I'd cleaned mold lines and glued wiggly components on the radiomen, snipers, and medium walkers a few days back and didn't like the idea of painting something that might twist around and rub away my work.  I almost went with the walkers instead but I'm less confident in my approach as it involves a number of techniques I've never tried before, but there will be time for that later.

As always, my pictures turned out dark.

You are no doubt wondering about my amazing approach to these models.  (As an aside, I've spent about the last half hour looking for a close up of just hands, mini, and brush so I could make up a "my painting technique is unstoppable" picture.  You have failed my stock photo needs again Internet.)  To scratch your curious itch, and to keep a record for myself, this is how it went.  Start with a heavy drybrush, or the closest I can manage, of VGC (Vallejo Game Color) Stonewall Grey on everything that isn't going to end up flesh or metal.  Next apply VGC Gunmetal to all metal areas.  VGC Bronze Fleshtone goes where you'd expect.  Follow with a liberal coating of GW Badab Black wash, assuming you still have a pot.  Because I was working with a small batch and had a heavy hand with the wash, I let the models dry for a while before continuing, but once I get rolling on a couple units at once I don't think drying time will be required.  Regardless, after the wash came Vallejo Model Color Yellow Ochre on the backpacks.  After a bit of experimenting, and taking stock of my materials, I went with a Vallejo Umber Shade wash over the yellow to get that mustardy-sorta-brown color I wanted.  I picked out the toes and tops of the boots, grips on the guns, belts, a strip of trim on the bottom of the jackets, the odd strap on a hat, and all the metal bits on the backpacks with VGC Black.  The penultimate step was a VGC Chainmail Silver highlight on the existing metal areas, plus picking out the metal bits on the backpacks.  Another Umber Shade wash on the backpacks, especially the metal bits, and the job was finished.  Basing still needs to happen, but the models themselves are done.

You can see the belts and jacket trim in this one.

The only real hitch in this process was figuring out the yellow.  My initial approach was to thin down the VGC equivalent of Snakebite Leather as a wash.  While this still seems like the right tactic, I watered it far too much and didn't get the results I wanted.  I tried a GW Ogrun Flesh wash on the left backpack, but the result was red instead of brown.  My thought now, and always, was Devlan Mud, but my supply is all but exhausted and it's part of my Legion scheme, so I want to preserve it for that use.  I've had the Vallejo wash for quite a while but never really use it, so I gave it a shot and it was almost exactly what I had in mind. 

Overall I'm happy enough with the result to begin preparations for the rest of my troops.  This batch strikes me as a bit on the drab side, so I may go back and do up some flesh colored hands, but mostly I'm hoping that having a non-grey base will give them some visual life.

Dust Up: Supremacy Showdown

Not this kind.  Well, maybe a little.

Special Disclaimer: New ground is breaking in this very post.  Etna's Vassal and I doing something I've been thinking about for a long while, a double battle report.  This is different for me as I generally try to cover both sides, successfully or not, when I do a battle report, whereas this time it's (mostly) all from my side.  You can find EV's half of the story here. 

You'd never know it from this blog, but I've been playing a lot of Dust Warfare lately.  It took a decent amount of sniffing around and shuffling feet, but I'm now at the helm of a nearly complete collection of Axis forces, thanks in part to the Escalation league that's been running for the last month or two at Huzzah.  (Wednesday nights if you're a curious party.)  I've had a good time with Dust, which is quick and interactive, and am now starting to appreciate the depth of the system.  It's one of those easy to learn, hard to master things.  I've even settled (I think) on a scheme and approach, which should make a certain reader happy.  Once I get going on it of course.  The Huzzah league is wrapping up currently, with EV and I finishing up tied for first.  We hadn't played each other during the league since we get in a weekly game on Tuesdays, so there were no handy head-to-head tie breakers available.  The only way to determine a champion was to duke it out.

Monkeys

Turns out dark models that lean forward are hard to photograph.

I've been a lazy hobbyist of late.  Games aren't a problem, and I'm probably playing more than ever since getting back into gaming a few years back.  The struggle against unpainted (and worse, unassembled) models isn't going as well.  Today I struck a tiny blow against the unpainted masses in the form of four apes.  Before painting began my focus was on speed, but that fell down the priority totem pole in the usual manner as I got to work.  Despite dragging my feet a bit the actual painting went quick enough, though it was accompanied by a large pail of drying time.  I "drybrushed" the fur (aka 90% of the model) straight over the "primer" that the models come out of the box with, then gave it a heart black wash.  Panzerfists got a coat of black, then bronze, then a slathering of Tamiya Smoke (along with the silver generator on Markus' back).  Final details were eyes and tongues, both red, along with white teeth and colored wiring.  I had been set to base my Dust mans in the same manner as my Blood Angels, meaning painted ballast with static grass tufts, but now I'm reconsidering.  My base edges are painted black because I'm not going for a super-realistic style.  These aren't real mans, they're little bits of plastic, so I feel no compulsion to try and camouflage the base to make it look real.  As such I'm thinking about painting the bases silver since they have a diamond steel plate sort of texture, plus the rivets around the edge.  Maybe a silver top and rivets with a black edge, though that's a bit more work than I want to sink into these bases.  Will this be the much looked for start of painting Dust?  Hopefully.  The monkeys were the first because they didn't need any flash cleaned or pieces straightened.  The rest of the stuff?  Not so much, which presents a bit of a hurdle.  Maybe Santa will bring me a fat sack of hobby momentum.