Restructuring and Rebuilding the Aquamarines (long and pic heavy) [Draft]

I started writing this post in 2013 and worked on it little by little over the years. 

[Chart done, in progress, and want]

A Landraider re-build with second paint job circa 1998
(click on image to enlarge)

As I have mentioned before, I started playing 40K back in Rogue Trader days--The year it came out in the US actually. I think I played a friend's Ork army in my first game. Soon after, I started collecting my own figures.

Back then for $20 you could buy a boxed set of 30 Space Marines, a boxed set of 3 Rhinos, or a boxed set of 2 Land Raiders! That was $60 for an entire army !! Yeah, yeah, inflation you say. According to DollarTimes inflation calculator, $60 in 1987 is equivalent to $124.67 in 2013.  Just for giggles, let's do a comparison. In 1987 I paid $125 (in 2013 dollars). For that, I got 30 Tactical Marines, 3 Rhinos and 2 Land Raiders. Today those models will run you... $380.25!

Over the years, I have painted a fair amount of Aquamarines-- Models pained in different styles and different levels of proficiency. Every time I got back in the hobby and started painting, much of my efforts were spent in re-painting and reorganizing models to the current codex. Still, I never managed to get a large force painted.

A long time ago, I made a rule for myself. The intention was to not assemble figures until I was ready to paint them... something I have mostly kept true. However, I have never given myself a restriction to buying models--There are only external limits like my pocket book and my wife.

My most recent attempt at reviving the Aquamarines (around 2009), was creating banner art in CorelDraw, and then adding a painterly-style shading in Photoshop. I finished the Squad banners and most of the character banners, but the chapter banner was left incomplete.

Chapter Banner WiP
(click on image to enlarge)

At the moment, I am still unable to field a cohesive and painted force. This post is the first step in achieving that goal. I am taking a que from Admiral Drax by creating a spread sheet (I love spreadsheets!) of all the models and plotting the stage that each one is in.

Lyonesse Lions WIP [draft]

Car Wars RPG Project [Draft]

Tau Kill Team Update

I'm pretty late to the party, but I made some progress on my T'au Empire Kill Team for Shadow War: Armageddon. I have only made a little bit of progress since my last update.

Some detail shots of the Shas'uyi, a specialist, and a Recon Drone. I have started adding edge highlighting.

Zara the Slayer Conversion WIP

This is a Star Player Blitzer Lilian from Meiko Miniatures that I am repurposing as a Zara the Slayer stand-in.

The entire left arm and lower right arm have been replaced with Dark Elf Corsair arms. She now obviously packs a stake!

Thrud the Barbarian WIP

For some gawd-awful heretical reason, I based Thrud on a non-GW, non-40mm base. All my big guys go on 40mm, but he seemed a bit too narrow.

Here is Thrud between 3e Blood Bowl's Mighty Zug and Mor'n'Thorg. It seems 32mm is a better fit, but my OCD says NO!

Fixed. 40mm base with the perfect casualty. Did I ever mention I hate elves? He is magnetized like all my other Blood Bowl miniatures for ball carrying.

Helmut Wulf Conversion WIP

This is the third attempt at converting a Helmut Wolf. The previous two attempts were slapping on a Rogue Trader era metal Space Marine chain sword in the right hand of a 2e Blood Bowl catcher and thrower respectively.

This *is* the 2e Blood Bowl thrower used in my second attempt. But this time I have used a Meiko Miniatures arm + Chainsaw.  I had to carve away quite a bit of metal on the thrower's shoulder, knee and chest as well as some elements on the chainsaw's reverse side to get the arm/chainsaw to fit the way I wanted.

To make him even more different than his twin brethren thrower, I shaved off the Mohawk on the helmet and added a wire face guard.

Dark Heresy Vehicles WIP

Today we have a short photo bomb of some quick and dirty vehicles for our Dark Heresy campaign.

This is a Rogue Trader era Space Marine bike. I lost the original handlebars so an Ork Mek was gracious enough to loan a pair, but I chose to make one out of an old IG tank smoke launcher. There are a set of metal and resin stowage from my bitz box added to the back of the bike.

A trio of Rogue Trader era Space Marine jet bikes. No modifications to the figures, but I did make the bike bases.

Helmgart Broncos WIP pt 2

Here is a little progress report on the human team. In case you missed it, here is a link to my last post.

I normally use black primer, although lately I have been experimenting with colored primer. But for this project, I went with with to ensure a really nice orange. Unfortunately I have realized its time to replace my base orange. It is Blazing Orange from quite a few generations of paint lines. I think from the first line after Coat d'arms stopped making Citadel's paints. It hasn't dried out, at least not entirely. But it has become very translucent.

Anyway, I have started to lay down the blue. After that, will be skin tones and then touch-ups. Then washes. Here is a list of the paints I am using in this project.

Orange:
Blazing Orange - Citadel Classic
Seraphim Sepia - Citadel
Golden Yellow - Citadel Classic
Fire Dragon Bright - Citadel

Blue:
Kantor Blue - Citadel
Drakenhof Nightshade - Citadel
Calgar Blue - Citadel
Ice Blue - Reaper

Metal:
Leadbelcher - Citadel
Nuln Oil - Citadel
Ironbreaker - Citadel
Runefang Steel - Citadel

White:
Dawnstone - Citadel
Administratum Grey - Citadel
White Scar - Citadel

I generated this list from paintRack--An amazing resource! I will gush over the app in more detail in a future post.

Helmgart Broncos WIP

In preparation for an all human league, I dusted off one of my original second edition teams. This used to be the Reikland Reavers, but after 2 paint jobs and a layer of white gesso, it was time to strip these bad boys.

It has been well over 10 years since I stripped any paint off of a miniature. I tend to just repaint them--Over previous pant jobs, clear cote and primer. But this time, I wanted to put that extra bit of effort. I used the last bit of unused model paint stripper left over from the early 90s.

I will be painting this team following the the above patterns, but with colors closer to that of the Denver Broncos.

d20 Zombie Apocalypse

I am working on a zombie Apocalypse campaign called the M-Virus Incident for my son. This campaign uses the d20 Modern Core Rulebook as its foundation,   additional rules I cherry picked from a variety of other sources, and specific rules I wrote for this campaign. If you are not familiar with the d20 Modern system, it is an offshoot of D&D 3/3.5 and shares the same basic rules set. However, d20 Modern adds more than it subtracts from it predecessor.

Image taken of the interwebs without permission.

The M-Virus Incident is set in your home town during a bleak Zombie themed Post Apocalypse that takes place in the mid 2000's. The players (PCs) are members of a group of survivors. They have been together in a somewhat safe location for about 2 weeks. Some of them knew each other before the 'Incident”, some have joined the group more recently. Supplies are getting low and the survivors have to go out for a scavenging run sooner than later. But wait, someone hear something...

At low levels of the campaign the players should feel like they are in a horror film—A single zombie will fill the players with fear and be very difficult to stop. Then during mid levels, the campaign should feel more like an action thriller—The players begin to chase down zombies and have conflict with other groups as packs of civilization begins to creep up. Finally, at high levels, it is a full apocalypse as hordes of zombies destroy everything in its path and wars break out between different settlements.

The standard d20 Modern occupation/class system is used, but many of the character creation steps are omitted, changed, or added. For example the wealth system is completely overhauled to represent hastily prepared equipment. Some of the big addition that really ad a horror vibe are permanent damage, insanity, and the biggest impact, multiple levels of fatigue (from lack of sleeping, eating, drinking, excessive damage, the environment, and illness).

Zombies are overhauled. They cause fear and they can't be killed by damage alone--Players will need to use called shots to put a zombie down permanently. I am also adding my most favorite thing ever--Tables!! But seriously, yes, there are pages and pages of tables for generating random equipment, food, weapons, occupations, encounters, insanities, traits, flaws, disorders, and injuries.

There is a unique set of features that I think is going to really help set the tone. At character generation, players determine a number of associates. They make note of the following:

Choose d3+3 associates. They can be family, lovers, friends, enemies, co-workers, acquaintances, etc.; They can be on good or bad terms with you. For each associate, provide the GM with their Name, Gender, Age, Occupation, and describe your relation/disposition with you. When the campaign starts, d6-3 of your associates will be with you. The remaining associates are given to the GM where their fate may or may not be discovered as the campaign unfolds.

also...

The player's characters and their associates aren't the only ones in the team. There are d3+3 additional group members. The GM will determine their vital statistics, equipment (d6 random items), and relations with each other.

As the campaign unfolds, players will have their attentions and allegiances split between party members and NPC loved ones. Additionally, when a PC dies that players takes over one of the other group members (either a loved one or on of the additional group members.

This is still very much a work in progress, and I will periodically post updates here.

Xenos Jungle Terrain WIP

This is a continuation of the Fungus Among Us project I started in 2013, and is part of my Modular Terrain System™. Yeah, I know, I'm not very good at finishing projects. Four years later I'm still not done... but I have added more to the project. You can trust me when I say that I have made progress. Really.

The base component of these alien 'trees' are Lotus Pods Stems that I purchased at a local craft store. The seeds and stems have been removed. The pod glued to a Citadel Wood base. Then that is glued to a CD. I bought my first Airbrush with X-mas money earlier this year. This is the first project I airbrushed.

I'm also working on some aquarium plant scatter terrain. Not exclusively 'jungle' but still part of this project.

D&D 3.5e PCs WIP

Awhile back, I started running my wife and son through a D&D 3.5 campaign. We are starting with The Sunless Citadel and if they want to keep going, we will continue with the rest of that series.

They decided to play twins, brother and sister--One is a fighter, ad the other a cleric. To emphasize being twins, I chose to build the base figures identically. The axe was custom built for my son's character, from plasticard, plastic tubing, and 2 orc axe heads.

Base colors down, nearing completion.

Cryx Army WIP Photo Bomb 2

Part 2 of a Cryx download of images. All magic weapons and models with Ghostly are painted in the same green hues.

Aesling Vikings WIP

A female Norse Blood Bowl team from Shadowforge's Gridiron line. This is my only Blood Bowl team comprised of non-GW models.

Bog standard line-women.

The only GW figure on the team is a Thrower. The other Thrower, the Catchers, and the Berserkers are an modified Shadowforge Norse-women. The 2 Ulfwerenar are Berserkers/Blitzers with heads from a HeroClix X-Men Wolvesbane. The Yhetee is a HeroClix Alpha Flight Sasquatch.

Here is a first draft of the team logo.

Cryx Army WIP Photo Bomb 1

Besides a recent post about Objective Markers, I haven't posted anything for my Cryx army in about 3 years. So I am just going to photo bomb my progress to date.

Eastern Steppes Bears WIP

I've been working here and there on a new Blood Bowl Chaos Renegade team. They are reminiscent of the old 2e Chaos All-Stars. I had an All Star team back in the day, but around 4th edition a mixed race chaos team was phased out of the rules. So some of the figures from my old team got folded into new teams.

To start with, I have 6 Marauders comprised of AoS Chaos Marauders with Chaos Knight shoulder pads and various human and chaos heads.

I also have 6 Marauders with Mutations built with the basic bitz as above. The mutations are taken from a variety of sources (from L to R): Claw/Prehensile/Tail, Tentacle, Disturbing Presence, Very Long Legs, Claw, Horrible Appearance.

The remnants of the old Chaos All-Stars in their original paint. The Goblin was picked up in a trade from the Lowdown Rats, and there is an Orc coming from the Bitz'box league. The new team will be painted in a different set of colors (Dark blue, Orange, and Grey) as this current color scheme is now being used for all the evil/chaos Star Players..

The original coaching staff have stuck around as well. All that is left is to dig up a couple of Assistant Coaches and a Cheerleader.

A first draft of the team logo. This will likely change, but this is a good representation of the team's new colors.

Khorgar Bengals WIP

Here is a Daemons of Khorne team I recently built for Blood Bowl.

These are pretty much just straight Chaos Marauders. There are a few Empire/Bretonian heads and arms added for some variety. I also double downed on additional shoulder pads.

On the daemon half of the team, we have some standard weaponless Bloodletters, 2 of which have Heralds of Khorne heads.

The big Guy in the center is a Basic Heroquest Gargoyle standing in for a Bloodthirster. The Bloodthirster has had its wings replaced with Varghiest wings.

Lastly is an initial design for the team logo.

Ash River Falcons WIP

I have been steadily working on a new Blood Bowl team for a tournament this weekend, The Carnage Cup. My club, Ordo Fanaticus is the tournament organizer. In addition to Blood Bowl, 40K and AoS will also be main attractions.

Here is a brief rundown of the rules.

Team building:
Teams get 1,100,000 gold pieces to construct their roster
A maximum of 2 star players may be taken
Teams can purchase re-rolls, apothecaries (if allowed), coaches, cheerleaders & fan factor
Teams may also include bribes as part of the roster as per the standard inducement cost
Chefs can only be purchased by Halfling team

Skill Packs:
you may only give a player one skill in addition to what they already are equipped with
no skill may be acquired via skill pack more than twice
choose 6 "points" of skills where normal skills cost 1 point, and double skills cost 2

Tournament Scoring:
Win: 3 points
Loss: 0 points
Tie: 1 point
Casualties: 1 point if your casualties caused exceeds your opponents

The team is a kit bashed Khemri/Tomb Kings team. The linemen, Anointed Throwers and Anointed Blitzers are comprised of various era WHFB/AoS skeletons and the Tomb Guardians are based off Crypt Horrors.

A portion of the team fully assembled prior to priming. I attempted zenith highlighting, but it came out too subtle.

Willy Miniatures J. Erlitz

Reaper Mummy Rising

Reaper Bones Spirits

WHFB Skeleton Regiment
horse head with antlers

In addition to the team, I have a Coach, the Star Player Ithica Benoin, 2 Assistant Coaches/Turn and Score Markers, 3 Cheerleaders/Re-Roll Markers, and a ball.

The Coach (not pictured above) is a GW AoS Wight King.

The additional Bitz I used to kit bash this project were Thousand Sons helmets and shoulder pads, Necron Lychguard heads, Kroot shoulder pads, and Dreamforge Eisenkern Stormtrooper shoulder pads.

Lastly, I of coarse designed a team logo.

Its gonna be close getting everything done in time!