Belisarius Cawl - 75% Done!

Hey diddly ho,

More work on Belisarius Cawl!! Getting there... slowly getting there with this monstrosity of a model. By and large all the major components are done, the main stages left are to add colour where power is flowing through the model, this will mostly be in the shape of blue OSL to match the rest of the mechanicum, but I may throw an odd bit of green in there as well for a servo skulls eyes or such. 

Secondary to that is making and painting the base to completion! Then I can glue the whole thing together and be done with it. 

I've very much gone for a tired and knackered look to the whole model, nothing to clean about it, generally in keeping with the rest of my mechanicum and my painting style in general. This model has lent itself to that style well I think. I'm actually weirdly proud of the skulls colour on this model, just quite pleased with how the white turned out!

Looking forward to getting a splash of complimenting colour on it though, that should really make it "pop". 

Peace out,

Rob

Belisarius Cawl - Progress Cawling Along

Hey gang,

Belisarius Cawl is one of those models where you feel like you have spent ages adding neat little touches to it and yet you don't appear to have made any progress!! That said, the pictures below are very nearly complete. The book at his feet needs a few more highlights and the skin needs a few pallid touch ups. Mostly though I need to add some blue OSL to the many generator aspects on his carapace hide which will tie him into the scheme with the rest of my Mechanicum very nicely. 

Before I can do that though I need to bring all the other gubbins up to scratch and glue them on, otherwise I might have to find myself adding glow to a single piece at once or worse, find that I've added glow where there should be shadow!

Peace out,

Rob

Belisarius Cawl - WIP

Hey gang,

In between working on the First Legion I've been slowly adding layers to my final Mechanicum model (for now). I've got most of Cawl built now, though there are quite a few bits still on the sprue as they are pretty much single piece add on parts and I'd rather not lose them! The two main arm are built but still lying in grey plastic as I want to get the base model painted and ready to go so I can just paint all the smaller fiddly parts in one go. 

Not much of an update, but here you go!

The yellow is pretty much finished, I just need to add some extra shading and wash to some areas. The black armour is also close to completion, but needs a little bit of stippling with a silver to give it some wear and tear. Everything else is just in the under coat or base coat stages, so lots to do!

Peace out,

Rob

Deathwing Return in Full Force!

Hey all,

So as promised I'm returning to my Dark Angels commission work this month and hoo boy do I have a lot to do! I'll reveal the extent of this commission this weekend, when I get a chance to take pictures of all that needs doing. 

Before I get into that though, I have some unfinished business with some Deathwing to resolve. This includes 2 x Deathwing Dreadnoughts, 2 x Deathwing Independent Characters and 2 x Deathwing Land Raiders. Once these suckers are out of the way, I can focus entirely on painting the black of the Ravenwing...

I just started to build up some steam last night and get back into the groove with these guys. Fortunately, when I start painting something new, I tend to record myself talking through the process and paints I used to get there for my own reference, so that was nice and handy! Here are some snaps of the old painting desk and whats coming up :)

And an up close picture of the gribbly you can make out in the background as well ;)

He's not glued together in that position, the waist is just a snug fit and held itself well for the picture, I have a long way to go with the yellow robes, before I start on the black plating and metallic sections. See you soon!

Peace out,

Rob 

Belisarius Cawl - Sub-Assembly Part 1

Hey gang,

So the final miniature I have in my possession to round off my current Mechanicum force is the Belisarius Cawl miniature (very kindly gifted to me by Mike from StandWargaming!!). I'm going to be using this suitably impressive model to represent Anacharis Scoria when I want to play cheesy games (because he is soooooo broken). Much like the Avatar of Ynnead, Cawl is a highly intricate model and as such I have begun putting him into sub-assemblies. 

I've not had much hobby time today, but I've had time to put the first half together, and here it is:

Unlike the rest of the Mechanicum, cawl is going to have yellow robes instead of his armour. The armour plates will be a matt metallic black. The trims will variably be dirty silver and brass. That's all for today folks!

Peace out,

Rob

An Evenings Work - Imperial Knight Progress

S'up peoples,

So yesterday I (hopefully!) piqued your interest on my Imperial Knight work. This is one of those projects that spent a long time half built in a box waiting for my enthusiasm for it to return, and it has returned with vengeance! Not necessarily because I'm excited to paint it per se, but more that I'm excited to nearly get the Mechanicum finished and off my damn to-do list!

Anyways, here is how I left you yesterday...

And here is where we found ourselves at close of day last night!

Well I had intended to stop at this point... But I then got a small second wind and applied warplock bronze to all of the plate trimming bar the pauldrons for the shoulders. So I have a little more of that to do then all of the metal apart from the main body needs a nuln oil wash. The skulls and scroll work will get washes as well and then highlighting can begin with aplomb! The yellow and black also need some various amounts of line highlighting doing as well.

The shield will receive a substantial amount of weathering as well, mainly to hide the poor conversion work!

The only bits still to be prepared are all the railings for the top of the chassis, but they will be done last as finishing touches so that they don't get in the way of the highlighting stage. Plus the base needs to be built...

It is getting there anyway!

Peace out,

Rob





Oh and the rivets...

Legio Cybernetica - The Final Builds Begin

Howdy peoples,

Today marks the return of the Legio Cybernetica to my work bench. After knocking out 3000 point in the first half of this year I stumbled with the final 3 models as I got a bit burnt out painting the yellow. I've now found the motivation to get the final 3 models from this force painted and call them complete! I have a Knight Paladin to finish building and paint, a Calix-class Thanatar (big lascannon and sledge hammer fist) to just build and paint from the bag. And then I had a Domitar chassis to convert to an Arlatax. 

So here is my (very very simple) conversion of a Domitar :)

Peace out,

Rob

Horus Heresy Review: Archmagos Draykavac

Greetings human,

Today I'm going to review one of the special characters from the Taghmata Omnissiah that actually has a model - SHOCK - HORROR - I know right. And a bitching model it is too! An unknown figure for the most part before the heresy, Draykavac rose to prominence as a member of the dark mechanicum leading the traitors from mars under Horus' Banner and committed many an atrocity to soak his name in the blood and oil of history.

Unit Stats

Draykavac is a very solid special character with excellent stats all round to compare to most Praetor level characters.

WS  BS  S  T  W  I  A  LD  Sv

  4      5    5  6   3   4  2   10    2+

Overall - While good, the statline doesn't quite justify his base cost of 240 points but his rules and wargear go a long way to making that up.

Special Rules

Like other mechanicum special characters you generally get a good bang for your buck in terms of special rules. He has the following USR to his name.

Stubborn
Fear
Battlesmith
Independent Character
Relentless
Precision Shot

Causing fear can really help in 30k when ATSKNF is not a thing. In addition he also has 3 additional special rules.

Warlord Trait - Death of the Flesh - This is Draykavac mandatory warlord trait and grants preferred enemy (infantry all types) to all units in the detachment when they are within 3" of an objective. Situational for some games, but in objective based games it is a brilliant boon against many many armies.

Liquefractor - A brutal, brutal special rule. Draykavac may swap all his attacks for one liquefractor attack at initiative step 1. This attack hits automatically and can only hit a model in base to base contact and IMPORTANTLY it hits that model specifically. Roll a 2D6 and compare this to the targets toughness value, for every point over the targets toughness value is they take a wound, so a roll of 12 on a T4 model would inflict 8 wounds!! Against targets with AV you half the armour for the comparison - so a landraider would have a value of 7, for every point over that value the vehicle suffers a penetrating hit, so a roll of 12 would grant you 5 penetrating hits! These are resolved at AP2... But only against targets with a toughness value.

High Techno Arcana - Stataraga - Walkers, monstrous creatures and super-heavy walkers are granted +1" to their charge and sweeping advance rolls. The charge is brilliant, but as a lot of units in the mechanicum can't sweeping advance that is less beneficial.

Equipment

This guy has oodles of good stuff to throw around.

Draykavac has a machinator array (toughness is already included in profile) with an inbuilt melta gun and servo harness. Importantly it also grants +2 attacks at I1 in ADDITION to his other attacks so you can liquefractor and use this.

A mechanicum protectiva grants him a 4++, though he can't boost this in anyway.

A paragon blade gives you an at initiative combat option though for the most part you're better off with his special attack.

Draykavac also has a cortex controller which helps if you are taking cybernetica constructs with control radius, but he doesn't have the ability to enahance them with cybertheurgy.

A graviton gun grants you a decent bit of firepower with haywire taking on vehicles and the blast marker making it difficult for your opponent as it becomes difficult and dangerous terrain.

Draykavac can take an abeyant for +25 points. Take one, stupid not too.

Finally he has a Djinn-skein which is brilliant! Coupled with cyber occulari which he can take 4 of for 15 points each, the Djinn-skein allows barrage units to take line of fire from the occulari. It also allows the warlord to grant himself or any unit of the primary detachment within 6" +1BS, because you can BS5 easily with mechanicum on Castellax for example you can make them BS6. This also allows deep striking units a no scatter radius of 6" around Draykavac.

Utilisation

Draykavac can only be taken in a traitor detachment, but he can be a HQ of a Taghmata Omnissiah detachment (not reductor or cybernetica) OR he can be the warlord of a Questoris Knight army (+1" to charges remember!). In a Questoris knight army Castellax become none compulsory troop choices and vorax become fast attack choices.

I honestly think running him in a knight army is the most competitive way to run him, with a 3-5 man squad of dark fire castellax running around with him, yes their guns get hot, but you can mitigate this by giving them BS6 for a re-roll! Give them some close combat upgrades and they become a tasty unit with +1" to their charges too. You can't join him to the squad as he doesn't have Patris Cybernetica but you can bubble wrap him with them.

But for most people that will not take him in a dirty list like that but in a normal Taghmata list, I would still stick him around a Castellax squad and then use Thanatars in cover for precision barrage shots with the cyber occulari. This will work best with a Magos Dominus in the backfield to buff the thanatars with cybertheurgy.

Alternative units that go well with him would be Scyllax or a large fearless meatshield of Adsecularis Covenant, but make sure you have a unit within 6" that can really benefit from that +1BS

Thallax will also do very well deep striking, though it is best to remember that this guy is not the fastest fella in the field. He needs a bodyguard to really excel and take some hits. His lack of eternal warrior does mean a paragon blade will make you cry so try to steer him clear of characters or units with those instant death capabilities and remember to shoot the shit out of him.

Peace out,

Rob

Horus Heresy Review: Adsecularis Covenant

S'up peoples,

All credit to the esteemed Henry South

Today I return to the fold of the Taghmata Omnissiah briefly. The Adsecularis Covenant are conscious, memory bearing human subjects that have been cybernetically enhanced and overrun to form a tech thrall. These are above servitors in the hierarchy as their flesh is more than just a component part of a none-thinking machine/flesh hybrid, but to become a member of the Adsecularis Covenant is the fate of any citizen of a Forgeworld deemed to transgress against the will and law of the machine god.

Unit Stats

As you  might expect for such a low ranking and penal servitude unit they have stats that are basic at best.

Crew:   WS  BS  S  T  W  I   A  LD  Sv

              2     2     4  3   1   2   1   7     5+


Overview: The Covenant don't have an impressive statline but you are only paying 35 points for 10! 35 points for 10!!! That is 3.5 points a model...

Special Rules

There is one special rule as standard with the Covenant:

Feel No Pain (6+): Handy for any strength 5 or lower weaponry just to negate a couple of wounds but not groundbreaking.

Equipment

Standard weaponry of the Covenant is a Laslock:

Laslock - 18" S4, AP6, Assault 1

35 points for 10 x S4 shots is nothing to be sniffed at! They do also come with a close combat weapon as well as their flak armour for the 5+ save in their profile.

Options

Adescularis Covenant have a surprising amount of upgrades available to them which makes them pretty customisable. Firstly you can upgrade the unit to have 10 more models at 3 points a pop, so 65 points for 20! This makes a massively cheap blob squad that you can repeat up to 6 times for 390 points for 120!! You can also give them a Triaros Conveyer as a dedicated transport but don't.

On the offensive front you have two different weapon upgrades with Mitralocks being the first:

Mitralock - 8" S4, AP6, Assault 1, Shred - free to upgrade

This greatly increase the ability of your Covenant to wound the enemy but at massively reduced range. If you play your covenant aggressively then this may work for you, but as a general rule of thumb I would leave them be.

The second offensive upgrade is heavy chainblades. +1 strength as I recall (though it may be +2 now I think about it) and two-handed these can work very well on a squad of 20 just by sheer volume of attacks. Costing 20 points for the squad its not going to break your wallet either. I've never seen this build played but I think it would be worth a punt.

Finally the squad has the choice to take any of the following upgrade:

Frag Grenades - Does what it says on the tin - 5 points

Carapace Armour - a 4+ save for 20 points is brilliant and recommended.

Rite of Pure Thought - Burning out the emotion centres of the thralls gives them fearless but they may no longer overwatch or make sweeping advances. This works incredibly well with chainblades or frag grenades and carapace armour on a 20 man squad to produce the mother of all tar pits! 15 points.

Induction Chargers - Makes laslocks and mitralocks assault 2 weapons, doubling firepower which is tasty for 15 points.

Revenant Alchemistry - Forbidden Dark Technology that grants Feel No Pain (5+), Hatred and Slow and purposeful for 25 points.

Utilisation

The Adescularis Covenant are a brilliant blob squad that scores and tarpits in equal measure when set up correctly. A squad of 20 thralls with carapace armour and the rite of pure thought gives you a fearless, scoring squad that can tarpit low attack units very effectively and put out OK firepower. This will cost you a vast 100 points. 120 fearless thralls with a 4+ save and a 6+ FNP will cost you 600 points and fill your troop slot. This is not a bad decision!!

120 points would allow you to give a squad chainblades, at this point you would have to use them more aggressively to get the best out of them it must be said. Consider adding tech-priests from the elite slot or even a magos from the HQ slot to give the unit more punch as well as protect that character. 

Peace out,

Rob

Double Trouble - 750 points Mechanicum Army

Hey Gang,

I'm going to be heading to Double Trouble, an excellent sounding doubles tournament run by Alex at From the Fang. I'll be heading up with Dan a guy from my local club and  several other blogger mates are going to such as Mike, Nathaniel and Dave from St Andrews Wargaming, Objective Secured and 40K Addict respectively. So all in all much merriment shall occur!

The List I am taking is not the most competitive but I really enjoy playing it and I hope my army will do well in one of the painting competitions. Though with the above guys going I am not stuck for amazing competition!

HQ

Archmagos Prime Ordinator - This guy is survivable with 3 toughness 5 wounds behind a 2+/3++ save. Additionally he can call a large blast S8 AP3 ordnance shot down like a chapter master, except he gets D3 shots. Plus as he is relentless he can do it on the move. He will be accompanying the Scyllax and should be able to tank wound for them as they move to the enemy. 

Troops

Scyllax Guardian Automata - These buggers number 4 and are just stock except with frag grenades to get them through cover better. They pump out a decent number of attacks and can basically opt for a S7 smash at initiative 1 that will double out T4 creatures due to rad effects. T5 gives them fair survivability especially when the Magos Tanks,

Thallax - Six Thallax with no additional extras. Leadership 8 stubborn jet pack infantry with T5 and 18 wounds all in, these guys are hardy even with a 4+ save and a 6+ FNP as their defence. Six S7 rending shred shots is nothing to sniff at, neither is 18 S5 attacks on the charge!

Heavy Support

Krios Venator - One of these give me a four shot S9 AP2 tank with effectively AV14 on the front hull due to its flare shield. Whilst the rest of the army is generally geared for moving forward and engaging, this guys wants to sit back and shoot all day long!

Overall

A very small elite army that will do well with a partner that has more mobility and numbers. Short of Strength 10 weaponry though, these guys will take A LOT of shifting. That is also an 18 wound majority toughness 5 OBJECTIVE SECURED unit. Woop! 

However if my partner is similarly elite, that will probably spell trouble. Should be good fun all round though :)

Army Pictures

In the above picture you can the finally finished pilots of the Krios Venators in their yellow bedecked glory also!

Peace out,

Rob

Converted Vorax Battle Automata - Painted

Good day all,

Today I have my finished and painted Vorax Battle Automata that I converted out of a bits box forage. I consider this very much my first successful full conversion, as opposed to modification conversions. I'm pretty please with how the conversion turned out and the paint job is OK as well!

My to do list for my Mechanicum now is to finish 4 Scyllax, the Imperial Knight, and start the Calix Class Thanatar. I also have a possible little project converting a tank into a medusa/mars bombard in case I want to field a Reductor army.

Peace out,

Rob