From PeterD: Late Roman Archers and Epic Halberdiers [Gift Shop] (120 points)

This is the first post from me this week, a unit of 12 formed archers for my Late Romans.  My wife flew off to Phoenix for the week yesterday and I've been left to deal with a blizzard with up to 40cm of snow expected.  So I am left at home with lousy weather, the Briar (national curling championship) on TV and some free time...

Shields are made up, based on pictures in the Notitia Dignitatum

This was not a planned unit, it just kind of happened.  I bought a pack of Victrix Late Roman Archers and Slingers over the summer mostly for the slingers, but also thinking that I could use the bow arms for Pict archers.  It turned out that the 2/3 of the figures are archers with composite bows that look out of place in the hands of Picts.  So there were 24 archers and I felt I needed to do something with them...

These are nice figures and there are lots of variant arms and heads.  I like the variety of loading, shooting and admiring one's last shot poses.  I included an officer and a musician who is likely over armoured but was fun to paint.   

My previous Roman archer units had been light infantry and I'd filled my quota under the TtS army lists, hence the formed bowmen unit.  I've given them the title Sagittarii Nerviorum. There are three units listed as Nerviorum under the Dux Britanniarum in the Notitia Dignitatum.  The name comes from the Nervii, a Belgic tribe from Northern Gaul as I continue to try and butter up my Belgic minion.  Other Nervii units served in Northern Gaul, Spain and even as an elite Auxiliary Palatina unit in the Eastern Empire.

The officer and musician come from the Armoured Infantry kit.

No Challenge bonus points, but I will claim the points on the Legions of the Empire Side Duel.

Also counting for the Legions of the Empire Side Duel are these Epic Empire halberdiers.  I am also going claim the the "Gift Shop" bonus points because Curt told me I could when I Voluntold me to paint these.

Curt has been running a Old World themed TtS! Campaign using these Epic scale figures and I've been running the Empire side.  More like the Sacrificial Offering giving my skill at these games.  One thing that I've finally figured out is that the bog standard grunts like these Halberdiers and pretty darn useful (and cheap to boot). 

Curt has a sizeable Empire contingent which looks lovely in a mostly blue and yellow livery.  To mix things up I went for a Crimson and White livery, which I believe means that these lad don't follow any of the Official liveries.  I will note that I've left their based un terraformed as Curt will want to base them according to his own system.

I had more fun painting these than I thought I would once I figured out a system.  By system I mean going with a wash technique and not worrying about the small details.  The flag and a couple of shields are free handed to kinda look like Imperial Eagles if you squint hard and have had enough wine.

Points wise I make it

• 12 archers in 28mm @5 pts each =60
• 36 halberdiers in 10mm @ 1 pt each = 36
• Giftshop bonus =20
• Total 116 points.

This takes me over my 500 point Challenge Target.

Finally since Martijn's been suggesting books, I have a book suggestion for him Buried by Alice Roberts.  it's a survey of archeology over the first 1000 years CE, looking at a number of specific burial sites.  She's got two others in the series dealing with the BCE and medieval eras (just out now in Canada).  The first two have some great history about the archeology in Britain and challenge a lot of ideas.

Well,  the first rule about buttering up minions is not to confuse Belgians with Dutchmen! However, as I am by now at least part Belgian, in mind if not by birth, I won't hold it against you. Too much. All joking aside, though, another fine post from you Peter! I like the variety in the archer unit, and I am sure Curt will be thrilled by those nimble halbardiers. Your method really works, and even without the wine the flag looks fine too. Well done! Thanks for the book suggestion, was it you who suggested it earlier? It is on my shelf now, I'm looking forward to reading it. Pointswise I agree with you, but will give you the by now customary bonus for shields and flag for a total of 120 points. Good job!

Martijn

From StuartL - Writing the Book on Treachery - Literature and Sarah's Library Cart - 145 Points

Hello all,

    As I mentioned in my last post, work has been keeping me very busy recently, so I have had to take a step back from painting and the challenge in general to focus on it. It also hasn't helped that both my monthly RPG game and my wargaming club meetings have fallen on the last two weekends, cutting my hobby time even more. So, I wasn't able to post anything last week as I was too busy marking essays and proof-reading them for my students. Luckily I have a bit of a gap in my schedule this week, so I have been able to push a few things over the line and get them ready for posting.

    My last post saw me taking Sarah's Library Cart over to the Literature section of the library. For this area, I wanted to post about the books I have spent the eighteen years or so reading, the Horus Heresy mega-series of novels by the Black Library (Games Workshop's publishing wing). The series is finally winding down with the release of the final book in the sub-series that wraps up the main storyline. I think in total there are about 90 books, plus loads of novellas and short stories. As you can guess from the title of the series, the main antagonist is Horus. In the books, Horus is the Emperor of Mankind's favourite son, Primarch of the greatest Space Marine Legion and is generally an all round swell guy. By book 2 he decides that he'd rather be evil and destroy everything (the writing at this stage is pretty poor if I'm being honest). The core reason is that he is convinced by a guy named Erebus that if he continues to be the dutiful son, he will eventually be overlooked and forgotten, and wouldn't things be much better if Horus were running the show? (GregB certainly thinks so). Erebus belongs to another Space Marine Legion, the Word Bearers. Originally, the Word Bearers were intended to go out into the galaxy and convince everyone (at gunpoint usually), that there were no gods and that everyone should believe in science, logic and human ingenuity. What they actually did was decide that the Emperor was the ONLY god and proceeded to build temples, shrines and holy buildings everywhere they went, while writing loads of books about how awesome the Emperor was. When the Emperor found out about this, he flattened their biggest temple and told them to cut it out. The Word Bearers then decided that maybe there were better gods to worship and became born-again daemon-worshippers. It was their plan to burn the galaxy to ashes and ruin everything for everyone for all time, they are just that sort of people.

    Anyway, with all that said, here are my entries for the challenge, 20 Despoilers for the Word Bearers Legion. If you're going to play the bad guys, you should play the absolute worst bad guys in the setting in my opinion, and the Word Bearers fit the bill. I can always be happy losing a game, because I know my army probably deserves whatever beating the receive. 

    Despoilers are assault troops, meant to close with the enemy and chop them into little chunks with a variety of very sharp and very nasty swords, axes and spiked clubs. On the whole, the Word Bearers are not the best melee force in Warhammer 30,000, but they are fanatical and favour massed infantry formations. 

    Being devout chaos worshippers, I have made sure to add lots of parts from 40K Chaos Marine kits, to break up the nice neat lines of 30K style armour. Shoulder pads, weapons and this fellow's lovely looking icon all help to give the army a less wholesome aesthetic. They also add a load of skulls to the minis as well. 

    And with that lot out of the way, it is time to head over to the next section, DIY. As has become the norm for me, I will be taking the Library Cart, and so here is my payment.

    This green-haired cyberpunk girl is a 3D print from Unit9 on MyMiniFactory. I have a few more models from this range coming up later today where I will go over how I painted it, so I will skip that detail for now. 

    I have found myself spending more and more time looking at 3D printing. My better half refuses to allow it in the house due to all of the materials involved that can be bad for your health and also because we would quickly need a second house after the current one was filled with 3D printed miniatures in no time at all. Luckily I have a couple of friends I can ask to print stuff out for me as there are a ton of cool models available these days.

On to the scores then.

21 x 28mm minis = 105 points

Literature section = 20 points

Sarah's Library Cart = 20 points

TOTAL = 145 Points.

For my duels.

Skulls (315) + 79 = 394

Legions (620) + 100 = 720

From Millsy: Good to see I'm not the only one painting traitor legions for 40K. If the Emperor wasn't such a complete buzzkill maybe he'd have more loyal servants! I love the deep red you have gone with here Stuart, there's a real richness to it that suits the chapter so well. The green hair on your cyberpunk girl has shades of Tank Girl for me so what's not to like?

From DavidB: White Scars 40k (140 points)

  Hu- Black Thunder

I am off for Duty this weekend...Should be my last medical review in the military. I think I may slam some energy drinks and a few pots of coffee before the EKG test tomorrow( for science). I would say this is the last of my 40K White Scars, but there will be more just not necessarily this challenge. What follows is the entire box from the Leviathan 10th edition box of Warhammer 40k. I got a rulebook, terminators, and some other miniatures I had to add. I barely got them completed today...well Friday as i am still burning the candle at both ends. These were all undercoated black with a zenithal highlight of white ink. The White Scar chapter insignia on all the models is from Pop Goes the Monkey.

Just a couple of the many skullz in this submission and you can also see how the white ink will mix with the other colors even though the ink was applied over the summer months.

My new Lt Knives for the White Scars. Wearing the lighter phobos armour, he looks pretty tough in posing and the addition of tyranid carapace to his armor. Honestly beside the rulebook hew is the reason I wanted the starter box. I was half thinking of making him and a few others Iron Snakes, but decided that all would go to the White Scars.

I really thought hard about making the terminator capt an Iron Snake, but I decided he would be a nice addition to replace KoSorro Khan on occasion.

He does look pretty sharp in the red cape and i actually do not mind the scenic bases. 

My White Scars are apparently foes of Necrons and Tyranids.

The terminators are a welcome addition to the White Scars and I cannot wait to unleash them on Razor.

The Ebon Keshig are a 30k unit for the scars and I use black for the robes and tabards on my force. I painted a couple of the terminator shoulder plates black for that reason and each marine had different red decorations added to them.

Especially the helmets with different dags on the helmet.

The terminator Librarian and Apothecary are welcome additions to the force. I almost made the librarian an Iron Snake, but I painted him as a white scar. I am not quite liking the blue in the terminator armor and may revisit him later, but he will soldier on with the Scars as is for now until I decide different. I couldn't let him be the only White Scar to fight Razor as a primed only model!

It could be just eliminating the red trim and turning it to gold as the back view is pretty good.

A slightly blurry photo of the sternguard  with the snazzy black tabards.

They too have a lot of red added in decorations including the helmets. besides the terminators they are another welcomed unit to the White Scars.

The Incinerators are a new Unit of Primaris troops with flame throwers. I haven't even read on what they can do  yet. They too almost went to the Iron Snakes, but the Sgt's mohawk decided them as White Scars.

His mohawk and that drawing of the Knife...He isnt going to use technology but instead tried and true!

The alternate build is an Incinerator with grenade...good visual reminder that my troops do have grenades to use!

My first Primaris dreadnought. I rather like this one and with the lascannon and rockets it will be nice support for the fast moving White Scars. 

Mostly clean and sharp, but still plenty of detail.

I like the Ad Mech power plant.

The tally....

one dreadnought- 20 points and 6 skullz

terminator capt-5 points and 17 skullz

Lt Knives-5 points and 6 skullz

apothecary- 5 points and 6 skullz

terminator Librarian- 5 points and 14 skullz

terminator squad- 25 points and 34 skullz

sternguard squad-25 points and 23 skullz

incinerator squad-50 points and 24 skullz

(note that the incinerators needed 10 guys to beat the skull count of 5 sternguard)

that is 140 points and 130 new skullz

Legion tally unchanged at 8 units or 22 legionnaires...these are 40k not 30k!

stompy robots of death- got another one for 4 

skullz just jumped from 29 to 159 

I have no idea where I am off to next as a bunch of butterflies are occupying my desk...it could be anything including more space marines!

Great looking White Scars here David! But with all the talk about Iron Snakes do I sense another Chapter project in the making...? I really like the ichor dripping off of Lt. Knives's sword, very cool. And the Tyranid "parts" on the bases really make these guys look battle-hardened. White can be a b*tch to paint but you've done a great job on these models, the red dags and cloak really pop too. Great production and 140 points for you!

Dallas

From DavidB: the Wrath of Khan, new acquisitions (190 points)

 Hu wolf Totem

The White Scars are my favorite Space Marine faction. It has been a long time before I could indulge in collecting them as my earliest attempts were chalky or glossy. The color white is a complicated color in miniature painting as well as it is in spiritual beliefs( like Pottawatomie or Mongol) White is the color of death like ash, bone, winter snow. It is also the color of purity like clouds and winter snow. I will have to give a nod to my grandparents for the stories which have led me to enjoy dualities and double entendre.

On a whim when dabbling with the speed and contrast paints I found a quick method to lay down base colors and get a nice effect for white that is very pain free and quick. I have found that contrast paints are great for blocking in base colors and highlights are now a breeze. The first gen army painter speed paints are a great glaze too. This brings up the zenithal highlights and slap-chop style of painting. Zenithal gives a great smooth transition and slap chop gives a nice texture. I can add to that as ink never really dries and will reactivate when made wet. If you use a spray coat of workable fixative( like krylon that i use) it leaves a matt finish and slight texture but it great for fixing ink and pastel colors in place.

If you use ink in zenithal highlights, paint and ink applied over it will reactivate. I'm pretty sure the 1st gen army painter speed paints were high in ink pigment which is why they reactivate and mix when painted over. Some of the models bellow used white ink as a zenithal highlight, but I wanted the reactivation to chip at the armor push some sharp whites. 

Why I like the White Scars....besides the obnoxious white. They are Space Mongols and with the markings on their armor and equipment( made and applied by the individual) they are always discounted on first glance as a barbarian rabble. They have artists, poets, and artisans in their number and they are shrewd as much as being straightforward in combat. Like having their fleet look like a confused cluster before rocketing away from an Alpha Legion trap, laughing while fighting traitor brother marines, doing fantastic lightning strikes on Horus's forces using speed and misdirection before they strike then fade away. Not to mention totally smacking and routing the massive Death Guard force at the Lion's Gate in a surprise assault that saw Mortarion banished and the Great Khan himself near death. The White Scars triumphed in a berserk fury of grief while the Death Guard fled in despair.

You cannot have white scars without bikes. I was tempted to get into the HH with all the enthusiasm that Greg has shown with the wonderful eyecandy, but the sky hunter bikes made me serious.

I can have 10 in a squad...er squadron but only have six total.I will need a lot more and at $60 a box it will be a minute. Do not expect the Golden Keshig as those bikes are 60 a piece rather than 3 for 60.

I think my White Scars will be fine with a couple of hordes of the regular sky hunters.

They are wonderful kits and an absolute joy to paint. A good thing i like building and painting them as there needs to be many more including a 30k smash captain.. er praetor ...

I am still waiting for the transfer sheets and the decal solvents before final weathering

Greg painted the deredeo and the plastic version is pure awesome...(Greg, get magnets as GW made it so you can swap all the weapons by providing chambers in the components for magnets)

I did not have magnets, so this one is glued together but given twin linked plasma rifles because why not. this Deredeo has heavy flamers to deal with what survives being shot at a distance.

This one was fun to paint too and I will get at least one more if not two.

The Contemptor dreadnought was fun to build, but paint wise it is lacking in comparison to the other dreadnaughts available. He will be getting lots of decals later.

The leviathan!.....slow but powerful I plan on using the speedy sky hunters to funnel the opponent into the anvil of my hardy units. I think I need another of these as I am sure this monster will be a shot magnet.

I like the heavy look even though it is all plastic.

That is a Son of Horus deredeo armor plate at his feet in the ash and rubble of Terra.

No magnets needed to swap weapons with these fellows!

Some Mk3 iron armor White Scars armed with volkite weapons. 

Two squads of 5 support marines for my two blocks of troops. 

I need to get more troopers for other heavy and special weapons. 

I liked these much more than the mk6 armor with the cables and trim on the armor. I painted them white but swapped in colors of red, gold, and silver for various pieces to show the individual flair of each White Scar. 

This one won't count yet as i painted him and photographed him before I made it to the giftshop.

Should the White Scars not make the top of the Legion duel, he will be the token sent to the victor. An old comm marine from the RT days and actual lead....he looks very smol with the HH marines. he does show where the master of signal got the design from though!

I can, but will not paint the white scar insignia on the horde of plastics primed. way too much time spent getting this one right!

Mk6 marines with the Sharknose missile  rocket launcher( let's not use the word with miss innit)

All the support weapon marine sergeants got the signal backpack extra for the servo skull and optics there....I needed the sgt models to look extra special in their role and optics to assist aiming seemed appropriate. I need to find more such bits in my bit box to add to the sensor/optic array.

I used every one of the launchers from the old RT box of plastics so it was no question about my white scars having a rocket launcher support section.

The Praetor....I like Greg's naming of the Axehole and it definitely suits this fellow. It was a chore to assemble this guy and an equal pain to paint him. I may get another HH box just to try him again, but block paint him before assembly.

The initial force of 30k HH. I got the Astartes  battle force with the special weapons, land raider and MKIII marines with the sky hunters( two boxes) and the leviathan dread  because I quit smoking. If I last another month I have been promised HH assault marines and the new primaris assault marines.

I built the jetbikes, dreads, and mkIII marines just a few weeks ago. The rest will have to wait until I run out of HH stuff to paint and have time to build them.

Scoring:

• three jet bikes at 10 points each- 30 points
• three dreadnoughts at 20 points each-60 points
• 16 marines at 5 points each- 80 points
• new acquisitions 20 bonus points

       a total of 190 points

side duels

• legion duel-8 units or 22 legionnaires
• stompy robots of death- three
• skullz- 29...not too many skullz in 30k

I will do a proper post and more closeups when I get to the gift shop for the master of signals, but he is now complete. the studded shoulder plates are difficult, but i like them better now that they are painted! I am thinking of combining the mkIII and mkVI armor to show the desperate logistics of the loyalist troops too in later additions. Jaghati Khan and other FW units will probably find their way into my collection now that I have a reason to add them...and a few may join the 40k White Scars as legendary units hence the urban rubble bases to fit in with the 40k cohorts.....especially the Leviathan!

Great looking models and impressive production here David, and welcome to the madness that is Horus Heresy gaming! The jetbikes are certainly very cool, and you cannot possibly go wrong with Deredeo dreadnoughts and MKIII Marines. I have a feeling that this is but the beginning of a wonderful and impressive collection! 190 points for you!

Dallas