Ultramarines Redemptor Dreadnought (Part 1)

 I love this annual event (Dreadtober) as I usually get a really cool model built and completed for one of my factions. Two years ago I did an original Rogue Trader-era Space Marine Dreadnought (Furibundus). This year I will be revisiting that  theme by doing a modern-era Redemptor Dreadnought.  I will probably be following the same painting steps used for the Furibundus,  although it has considerably more detail, so I will likely be using more colors in addition to the Ultramarines scheme.

Redemptor in three sprues. 

Why I chose this Dreadnought is simply because it came with the final issues of Imperium Magazine and I thought it would make for a good endcap for the year considering how many Primaris Ultramarines I painted while I was recovering from my heart event earlier in the year. 

I haven't decided how I'm going to equip this guy yet, but these in depth profiles from the magazine are giving me some ideas...

Inspirational load-out guide. 

These magazines always have these small charts that are fun for rolling up little details about your specific models. They also have record sheets to track stuff like opponents defeated, etc. 

Battle Record charts.

I couldn't resist doing it for this post. So, rolling on the table my guy's name is Brother Allister and the fate that got  him interned into a  Dreadnought sarcophagus was that he was struck by a plasma blast. -Ouch!

Another reason I valued this magazine was the indepth and expanded assembly instructions that contain. This should be quite handy really soon! 

A Snippet of the assembly  guide

With the plastic piled up and clippers in hand, it's time to get Dreadtober 2024 going!!! 

Ready to build. 

What are you going to build and paint? Leave your pledge on the dreadtober blog page once you have it figured out. 

Thunderer Struck! (Part 1)

 Here is the next unit of my recently acquired second-hand Warhammer Fantasy Dwarves to receive my attention. I have already updated their bases from 20mm to 25mm.

Rebased.

Like the previous unit, I intend to just paint over the existing paint job. Weirdly, this unit featured even more metallic colors than the previous lot including green metallic clothing and gold beards.  Color-wise it's surprisingly close to the scheme I'm using, just in metallic. 

Before. 

But unlike the Warriors unit, I felt these guys needed a bit more than just grass tufts. Rocks, random rocks scattered about seemed like a logical, and easy, thing to do. However I needed more small rocks and I wasn't about to pay $9.99 for a bag of them when my front yard looks like this: 

Lots o' rocks.

After a matter of minutes I had gathered up a few appropriate, and interesting enough, rocks to serve my basing ambitions. And I finally found a use for the empty container that came with the old Citadel Basing kit. 

"I gotta rock."

With a few strategic glued down rocks, I decided that the unit leader would look snazzy with an orc skull on his base. Then it was time to apply all the rest of the grit.  -Exciting stuff huh? 

The process for painting these guys is the same I used to paint the previous batch of Warrirors. The original painter painted the wooden stocks of the rifles in a bold burgundy color. I drybrushed on a layer of Screamer Pink and finished that with a wash of Carroburg Crimson to get a look that I liked. 

After.

And with that I have the first guy of this unit done. Well, 'done' to level that I'm satisfied with. I think I can knock out the rest of them in part 2.  

The Deadly Assassins (Part 9)

The Deadly Assassins return! The sort of annual-ish feature where I paint up an Imperial Assassin. Somehow I skipped last year, but this year I'm (sort of) catching up by doing two-in-one with this odd-ball model. 

Admittedly this post should really be called the Silly Assassins. This model is called Krak Shot, and it's inspired by an original humor piece, by an artist on Deviant Art, titled Callidus n Vidicare Combo. Clearly it's ment to be a punny joke, and when I found out someone made it into an stl.file I had, half-jokingly, suggested on the Neverness Facebook Group that someone should make a copy for me.  Well, my old friend Scott accepted that challenge and was thrilled to make it for me. He said it was quite challengingt to print but on the third attempt he got it. And as you can see, it's quite fragile. 

After pondering what to actually do with it, I decided to make it into an objective marker. It's simply too silly to use it as anything else. I wanted to use a more ornate base but chose to just keep it simple. 

A few manic months went by and I eventually made some progress on this model. I primed the model in Chaos Black then gave it a layer of Abaddon Black. This is advice that I got from Duncan's brilliant tutorial of painting Synthskin, which I followed for both figures here. 

Black on black. 

The next stages was to apply Dark Reaper to all of the higher areas, followed by Hawk Turquoise and ending with a highlight of Fenrisian Grey. 

Synthskin. 

The rest of the model was fairly straightforward forward and (mostly) followed the steps laid out in Part 3 of this series. .

The Callidus' twirling and gravity defying hair was painted using Sunburst Yellow washed in Agrax Earthshade and layered again with Sunburst Yellow. I thought this turned out good despite how tricky some of the areas of the hair braid is to reach.  

And there we have it, two Assassins on one model. I must apologize for the darkness of these pics;  I'm still trying to figure out the lighting in this new studio that I am in. I may edit in some  extra pics some day.....

Celestial Lions Chaplain (Part 1)

 Recently I decided to slightly upgrade my Celestial Lions from being a 1st edition Kill Team to a small force with just enough models to fill out 750 points. One of these models will be an additional character model and this time it's a Chaplain.  A metal Chaplain from the mid-'90s specifically. 

A metal Chaplain.

He was primed white way back in the late '90s with the intention of painting him for my Brother's Ultramarines but clearly that intention was unfulfilled. 

Pin in place for his arm.

While digging around the Neverness Archive in search of an appropriate character model to add to my first born Celestial Lions, this model really seemed to fit the bill. I attached him to a 32mm base and set about drilling out some holes to pin his arm on. 

Arm pinned and attached. 

Next I dug through my pile of printed Celestial Lion shoulder pads that The Bob hooked me up with aeons ago.  Most of my Celestial Lions have crudely painted on chapter icons but I thought it would be appropriate for this particular model to have a more professional look. I say that because I imagine that the other models I have may have had to update their armor in an ad-hoc manner as they likely had to scavenge serviceable parts from wherever they can find them. 

Next up, I will prep the base and begin the first proper stages of painting...

The Santa Dwarves Demise (Part 3)

Finally, I have finished this unit. But before I celebrate that,  let's get to know Bluebeaed.

 

And here is Bluebeard, the Champion who leads the former Santa Regiment. Adorned in garish color choices, most of which are metallic, and a crude attempt at portraying a bloody Warhammer.  Rather, this is how he was when I bought him, and clearly he is ready for a bloody good yule celebration. 

Before. 

Like the rest of his kin, I opted to paint right over this existing scheme. For the most part, this seemed to work out just fine. I made an exception for the Champion's bluebeard which, I must confess, kind of grew on me. I guess where I grew up reading 4-color comics I have always had a fondness for the blue/black hair style. I did tone it down by applying Nuln Oil over it to mute the metallic sheen of the beard. 

New colors applied. 

As I got to final steps I decided that I would honor the original painter's desire to have this guy wielding a bloody hammer. I used Blood For the Blood God technical paint to get the point across. 

Finished model 

Once I was satisfied with the highlights and touch-ups, it was time to flock their bases. As a call back to the original dwarf painted oh so many moons ago, I used static grass on the base in addition to the grass tufts that I have become so fond of in recent times.  Being so squat and stunty as they are, I wasn't too eager with the application of the tufts because I didn't want to obscure the models' too much. Therefore I took a more conservative approach and used them sparingly. A few of these models might not have any tufts at all! 

Hang tuft.

They rank up so much better on the 25mm bases vs. the old 20mm from the previous editions of WFB. They also seem to have a bigger presence as individual models as well, and the option to put a few additional things to their bases gives them more options for characterization that he 20mm bases simply didn't allow. 

Here's the command section. I think the standard bearer is my favorite of the whole bunch. 

So there you have it, my first painted unit of Warhammer Fantasy Dwarves.  Next up, probably another unit from the same deal, also from the Battle For Skull Pass set. 

Celestial Lions Retro Tactical Squad (Part 1)

 It's been bugging me for a good while now that my Celestial Lions are sitting in limbo. They were made for the first edition of Kill Team (the one that used 7th edition rules) but haven't been playable since.  When Da Masta Cheef returned for his monthly work visit, he proposed a 750 point game. With such a small points level in mind I  contemplated playing one of my smaller factions and the Celestial Lions stuck out as a potential candidate for such a game. Sadly I couldn't join that game anyway, but he'll be back one day, and I plan to have these guys waiting for him. 

I know some Necron players who would consider this paint job 'done. 

These miniatures are from the 2nd edition era of Warhammer 40,000. Specifically these are the Space Marines from that edition's main box. Although only the Sergeant and flamer are from that. The others, all cast in blue plastic, were from a Waldenbooks exclusive set. I uncovered a bag full of these guys, that Warfrog gave me ages ago, when I was looking for a single one of these guys to paint for their anniversary event last summer. These miniatures are definitely iconic and were the default space marine miniature for most of the 1990s. 

The full squad.

After cleaning up the flash and mold lines I  applied grit to their bases. A few guys got a skull on their bases too, because it's just the Grim Dark thing to do. 

Gritted and ready for paint. 

The loose shoulder pad is for a character I'm doing for these guys,  but I'll talk about that in a future post.  So  I cracked open my old Krylon 18k Gold paint and blasted away. 

Solid fool's gold. 

And with that, these models are now primed and basecoated. Well the armor anyway. The rest of their details will be picked out soon. 

Awaitng the next steps...

The Santa Dwarves Demise (Part 2)

 Work has slowly progressed on these stunties. The Santa theme has now been thoroughly eliminated. The only miniature I kept with a white beard is the standard bearer, although I toned it down with a Nuln Oil wash. I will likely give his beard another highlight of white before he is truly done.

I bet that's noisy when it's windy. 

Most of the other beards were painted using an assortment of colors and techniques. I wanted variety amongst these guys, the idea that they're all the same age or whatever seems a tad absurd to me. There are a few guys with gray bears but I used differ tecniques on each one to attempt to create a subtle difference between them. Here's three examples of that, however I failed to take note of which technique was used on which model. 

Slowly but sure I got the unit up to a standard I was pleased with, and I think they look good massed up in a big unit. Obviously I still have to deal with the bases. And there are also a few more areas I want to tweak a bit. 

Insert champion into gap. 

And now attention must be drawn to this guy, the unit's champion.  This guy is painted in some, um, interesting colors. Garish might be an appropriate description. The trim on the armor is painted in metallic green, his beard is painted in metallic blue, the bright red is ever present on the cloth parts of this model and it's also present on the Warhammer as well. I'm assuming it's intended to represent blood. Maybe when this model was painted Blood For The Blood God was not out yet? 

Gleaming with grudges. 

I plan on painting directly over this existing paint job just as I did the rest of the unit. But I think we'll cover that in Part 3.