Wallet Pain...

Decisions, decisions, decisions...

It seems everyone in the hobby world wants my money at the moment.

A little bird has told me that the Wargames Factory Samurai are hitting stores very soon. As in will ship in the next few weeks if not before. I am expecting that these will be a similar price point to other WF products which means for us Aussies it will be $50ish for 25 plastic Samurai with posable arms.  I am VERY excited by this.

In other news... Victoria Lamb's miniatures company will be adding these to their shop shortly.  I am not exactly sure what I would use them for but man do I want to use them.  Actually I do know what I want to use them for.  My Forge World Tallarns.  The resin lasguns that they come with are sooo flimsy that I am afraid to assemble the army.  The stocks on those rifles match these ones sooo it should be a simple weapon swap.  I think I need to order a few and check the size.

Just when I thought I had the whole range, Scibor has released more of the Adeptus Custodes models. Heroes this time.  As I have an army of the grunts I think it is time to get some personalities in the mix. (I love the bodies of these models but honestly I will probably ditch the arms on the top two models as I think they look a little too...  cartoony?)

I especially like this guy:

All of those models are Scibor's extra large 28mil scale.  If they are that big...  I want to see how big there version of Calgar is next to a regular model.  He is standing on a 40mil base.

And last but not least... the Big Kahuna of money drains...

What is that awful screeeeeetching sound?  That is my wallet screaming in pain!

Brian's Motor Pool (Blood Angel's)

Wellllll... here is the last of Brian's Blood Angels including my favourite model in the army. The Baal Predator. Enjoy

As one of the uniquely Blood Angels units the Baal Predator is a “must-have” for my army pool. As with many of the units in my army this model was inspired by the Baal Predator Blood Angels card in the Siege of Malogrim Hive starter set of the Warhammer 40,000 CCG by Sabertooth Games. It’s also a ton of fun to throw handfuls of shooting dice each shooting phase during a game of 40K.

This tank is named “Ramiel” after the Angel of the same name whose name means “thunder of God”. Equipped with twin-linked assault cannons, two heavy bolters, and a storm bolter Ramiel definitely brings the noise and is able to generate an absolutely withering barrage of fire.

This model has been upgraded with several Forgeworld resin accessories, including extra armor, a Blood Angels front armor plate, an Imperial eagle rear hatch and several pieces of stowage. The rolled tarp on the back of the turret has been painted with an urban digital camouflage pattern consistent with the camo cloaks worn by Scout Squad Remus. I sculpted the purity seals and parchments adorning the turret out of epoxy putty to add a few extra touches.

This model was selected as a finalist by the judges during the Golden Demon painting contest at Baltimore Games Day 2010.

The landspeeder model has probably experienced more frequent evolution throughout the various editions of WH40K than any other vehicle kit that comes to my mind. This model is built from one of the plastic kits first introduced in the third edition starter box. As with many of the other units in my army this unit was also inspired by the various Blood Angels landspeeder cards in Sabertooth’s WH40K CCG.

This vehicle is named after an alternative spelling of the Angel Ambriel (Amriel). The name Amriel is found inscribed on an oriental Hebrew charm (kamea) for warding off evil.

The Forgeworld Blood Angels icons (the winged chalice on the front and the Blood Angels chapter symbol on the left rear quarter) were added to provide an enhanced Blood Angels look. This model was selected as a finalist in the WH40K Vehicle category of the Baltimore Games Day Golden Demon painting competition in 2009.

The angel figures used to create these objectives are Reaper miniatures. With my army being an urban-themed army in its basing and camo schemes I decided that my objective markers would be statues adorning an Imperial hive city. In addition to the statues, each column has a street light component to it from the WH40K city terrain kits, making these statues both aesthetically pleasing and functional to the city’s populace in times of peace. Each column has withstood the test of combat as evidenced by several bullet holes and other battle damage inflicted upon them during past combat engagements. The laurel on the head of one of the statues was added from the contents of my WH40K bitz box.

If you want to check out more photos of all of Brian's stuff I highly recommend that you cehck out his photo album:
http://www.dangerplanetgames.com/dpnuke/modules.php?set_albumName=album149&op=modload&name=gallery&file=index&include=view_album.php

Guest Spot: Brian's Blood Angels Part 3 (MOAR AWESOMENESS)

Today will see us take another look at my buddy Brian's Beautiful Blood Angel Army. I really like that every unit in Brian's army has a story and reasons for the way they are built. Having seen this army painted over the years I can truly say that it has evolved with it's creator. Today we look at some tac squads and Dante... Enjoy:
After painting Assault Squad Harbiel I wanted to take a break from painting models red. In a recent game with a group of friends I was able to borrow Commander Dante to lead our team’s Blood Angels army. Inspired I decided that I would finally set about painting one for myself.

The biggest decision I faced before painting this model was to paint it using metallic paints or to go for a non-metal metal approach. Most of the gold-armored Blood Angels paint jobs I’ve seen over the years featuring the metallic paints just didn’t seem to “pop” to me. The details of the models often appeared to me to be lost in the various shiny reflections of the paint. On the other hand, while I really like the look of the non-metallic metal paint jobs I’ve seen, most recently on pages 66-67 of the Codex: Blood Angels my concern with taking this route was that the model would look out of place when arrayed with the rest of my troops on the table top.

Ultimately I decided to mix the two approaches. I’ve never seen it done and am all-in-all pretty happy with how it came out. I prefer the look of the non-metallic metal for the gold of the armor but used metallic paints for the joints, pistol, and jump pack to preserve some consistency with the rest of my army. To paint the armor I attempted to follow as best I could the guidelines set out by ‘Eavy Metal painter Darren Latham in his ‘Eavy Metal Masterclass article on pages 74-81 of WD363.

Aside from the non-metallic paint scheme to paint the armor, another notable difference is that I decided to paint the Axe Mortalis with a blue lightening scheme rather than the steely metallic look of every other power or force weapon in my army to date. I thought that this model would really benefit from the added color and think that overall it worked out well for my first attempt despite my historic belief that lightening-covered power weapons looked, to me, to be relatively cartoony.



As with several other of the units in my army pool, Tactical Squad Morpheus takes its name from a Blood Angel chapter card in the original Space Marine deck of the Warhammer 40K CCG by Sabertooth Games (Siege of Malogrim). The artwork on the card prominently featured a bald-headed tactical marine wearing a breathing mask and wielding a flamer which is why this squad is likewise equipped.

The model for Sergeant Morpheus is one of two “Blood Angel Sergeant” models released during the second edition. As with Sergeant Aralim from my other tactical squad I maintained the visual style of the second edition with the model by painting him a back banner.

Usually I prefer to pair a heavy bolter with a flamer in the same tactical squad but when I built Squad Morpheus to support my Fall 2007 league list I decided that needed an increased capacity to address heavier armored targets at range and settled on the versatility of the missile launcher. This was later upgraded to a lascannon for my Spring 2008 league list.

Several of the troopers in this squad were given more personality than the average trooper in Squad Aralim. One of the troopers bears fangs (a modified Space Wolves head) as a nod to the vampiric theme running through Blood Angels history with the Red Thirst. Another looks down the sight rail of his bolter. The upper torso of this model was taken from the driver of a Rogue Trader era metal attack bike. “Knifey” is a personal favorite and generates all sorts of good-natured trash-talk on my part when he enters hand-to-hand combat, especially if he’s facing off against an enemy independent character.




Tactical Squad Aralim is typically deployed as the “anti-armor” tactical squad due to being equipped with a power fist, melta-gun and heavy weapon able to penetrate high armor values. Originally fielded during Danger Planet’s Fall 2007 WH40K League the squad was equipped with a missile launcher. This was upgraded to a lascannon during the 2008 league when more points became available in the list.

Sergeant Aralim takes his name from an alternate spelling of “Erelim”. Erelim, according to an online repository of angel name data, is the name given to one of the ten orders of angels who are ruled by Michael. Known as “the valiant ones” they are charged with the protection of the trees, grasses, grains and fruits of the Earth. Basically, these guys are going to hold the ground and preserve it for those who will come after them.

The model for Sergeant Aralim is one of the “Blood Angel Sergeant” models released in the second edition. In keeping with the style of that edition I opted to give him a back banner. This standard represents my first ever effort at hand-painting a banner for one of my models.

As an additional throw-back to my earliest days of the hobby with Rogue Trader I decided to also equip this squad with old-style combat blades. Who says tactical squads just stand back and shoot? Aralim is as happy to have his troopers buzz through enemies in hand to hand as he is to see them remove an opponent’s heavily armored vehicles from the landscape at range.

Lots of Leaked New Necron Photos`

Well after been so tight lipped about the new and up coming hotness looks like GW either intentionally leaked a crud load of images to Beasts of War OR Beasts of War got the big scoop... Either way I am a very happy panda... This stuff looks great. I will skip the labels (since the photos are labelled) and skip the commentary... Enjoy...

Exciting New Toys for Guard (and Ogre) Players

Well it is 5AM... My bags are half unpacked across my living room and I am back in Australia... Gotta love jetlag...
Sounds like a perfect time for a blog post!

I had a few hours of downtime in the airport in Brisbane on the way back down under and found a few things that I thought were noteworthy in the new and up and coming.

Victoria Lamb has continued her trend of releasing high end metal conversion kits for guard models. You might remember she has previously done kilted guard conversion kits. This time around she has a very exciting penal guard conversion kit complete with RT style bomb collars and some nice character heads to mix in with the convicts. I really like how she has more than twice as many heads available for this kit adding a real differentiation to the squad or squads when you build them.

Here is a close up of some of the heads and their size.

And for scale purposes... (Riddik anyone?)


Kromlech is back with some exciting stuff for those of us who have been wanting to make Blood Pact troops... Armoured torsos and matching backpacks... The backpacks are separate so you do not have to attach them but they come with the torsos.... so why not?

Here are some shots fully stollen from the internet of the torsos with GW, FW and maxi-mini kits.


They have also come out with a series of gas mask heads... I LOVE these especially the one in the upper right hand corner. I need an army's worth of those soon I think...


And as it is the season Scibor has released it halloween promo model. I love their Halloween stuff. This year their choice is Aaaar2D2... An ork Star Wars nod... He comes free if you order $40 or more dollars from Scibor this month... You can also buy him on the side.


And it should be noted that you WFB players out there have options if you hate the GW butcher model as much as I do...
Scibor has released this big boy... (for half the price of the GW one... In Australia anyway)


Hope the rest of you are getting a good nights sleep out there.

B

Guest Spot: Brian's Blood Angels (Part 2)

Today we will continue to look at Brian's fantastic BA army... Here is Brian with more...

Israfil is the first painted assault squad that I’ve ever fielded. Over all of the years I’ve played Space Marine armies (Crimson Fists, Space Wolves, Dark Angels, and now Blood Angels) I’ve always relied on tactical squads to get the job done. However, this being a Blood Angels army I finally felt that the time was right to utilize jump troops. Since they became “Troop” choices in the White Dwarf Codex: Blood Angels I wanted to include them even more.

Sergeant Israfil is named after Israfil, the Angel of Judgment Day, who is assigned to blow the horn on the day of judgment. I like to think that one sure indication that your judgment day has arrived is if Blood Angel assault squads are raining from the sky onto your head…

Sergeant Israfil wields a power fist and his model is one of two “Assault Marine Sergeant” models released during the second edition. The other one, the model shown below with the Mohawk haircut, is also a member of this squad. To commemorate the shared history of these two models I play each of them as the leaders of their half of the group if the squad breaks into combat squads.

This squad also carries two plasma pistols. Because this squad was assembled and painted prior to the release of the new Codex: Blood Angels I didn’t have all of the latest fun alternative weapon options now available to assault squads. With Sergeant Israfil's power fist and the moderate strength and AP of the plasma pistols this squad is often tasked with taking out enemy vehicles and heavily armored infantry from close range. They are frequently supported by Arel, the Furioso.







The Death Company squad was the first squad that I painted for this army pool. I selected them as my first squad to build and paint not only because of their effectiveness in the game but moreover because they are a uniquely Blood Angels unit. This unit was a persistent element in my list prior to the release of the latest Codex: Blood Angels and the completion of my two assault squads (Israfil and Harbiel) but has since seen action less frequently.

These models are the metal versions released and made available preceding the release of the newer plastic Death Company boxes. I’ve got a box of the second edition “Death Company” box, made up of the old “Blood Angel Marines” models, but decided not to utilize them. The chaplain model from that box will likely see building/painting/playing before any of the troopers.

I always intended to field this squad with jump packs. As such, I needed to add the jump pack straps to the figures by sculpting them out of green stuff. This was done in two groups of five marines. My skill in working the putty grew from the first attempt which is why the later five marines sport better sculpting jobs in my opinion. To add to the look of the squad I modeled each member with Dante’s backpack which sports some Blood Angels iconography. I was able to buy these in bulk from the GW Battle Wagon during its last visit to Danger Planet.



Over the years I have added several Forgeworld models to my collection. This drop pod has the distinction of being the first of them to be assembled and painted, or to be more accurate, it was painted and then assembled. I painted each of the component pieces before the final assembly. After the final assembly I added the scorching from the control thrusters to the top and from the atmospheric entry to the bottom.

This drop pod was added to my army pool to serve my Furioso, Arel. The killer was that after it was all done I went to place my dreadnought into it only then realizing that the back-banner I had previously embellished my Furioso with prevented him from being able to fit inside.

This model was selected as a finalist in the WH40K Open category by the judges of the Golden Demon painting competition in Baltimore, 2010.



Many of the Blood Angels cards in the initial space marine starter deck of Sabertooth Games’ WH40K CCG were fast attack units. One such card was called something like “multi-melta attack bike squadron”. Despite the name, each bike in the illustration was depicted with a heavy bolter. This card gave rise to my squad of attack bikes.

With my Blood Angels I prefer to field attack bikes instead of a devastator squad for heavy weapons fire. Their ability to move quickly and still fire their heavy weapons makes them a great fit in a Blood Angels army in my opinion. They are also relatively durable and hold their own in close-combat quite well.

This squad is named after the Angel “Aglasis” who is said to be able to carry anyone or anything anywhere in the world. Equipped with turbo boosters these attack bikes can really get around.

The models comprising this squad are loaded with bitz from various space marine bike kits in my collection. All of the bikes feature stowage from the scout bike squad boxed set. The multi-melta bike also bears the faring of the Space Marine Chaplain’s bike and the rider was originally the pilot of a landspeeder Typhoon. My favorite bit in this squad however is the sidecar gunner with the binoculars. I recruited him from my original Rogue Trader metal attack bike kit where he ably manned the sidecar gunner’s seat as well.