Useful Links

 Just a quick collection of the most common links I tend to refer to/link to when commenting elsewhere.  If you don't know about these already, they can be pretty handy.






Bolter and Chainsword Downloads - A number of good resources.  Especially cool IMO is the extensive collection of decals that you can download and print out (with decal paper).


Lexicanum - Good basic info on all sorts of 40K background info.  One of the especially handy parts is their List of Space Marine Chapters

Stuff of Legends - Marvelous resource for old miniatures.  Sadly there are quite a number of holes, but there's a lot of cool old stuff there, and of special interest to GW-inclined readers would be the old Citadel catalogs from the early years and Rogue Trader era.

Anyone have other links they frequently refer people to?

Christmas Usurpation - Scythiak WIP and other holiday cheer

Ho ho ho and all that! We're having the first White Christmas here since 1966 (though I wasn't around for that one), which is nice for sonofsonsoftaurus. Tomorrow we'll get out and play in it; should have a few inches.

Un Ho Ho Holy Trinity

Here's a couple of the WIP Psyker Battle Squad/Sorcerer Cabal. I think the color scheme at this stage may have been influenced by the season.

Imperial Armour 10 Badab War part 2 up for pre-order

Just a quick note for those interested, it's available from Forge World now.  Conveniently comes with a slipcase that you can fit both volumes into.


You do already have the other one, right?  If not, you can buy both parts together, and at a discount even.

Scythiak Usurpation - WIP Ogryn and Techno-barbarian platoon pics

Semester's over, last project done, grades are back and they are good!  Hurrah.

This weekend also sees my in-laws in town, for our pre-Christmas celebration with them before we have our separate ones next week.  Nice seeing the nephew and niece and getting the cousins together for playing and general mischief.  As part of our gift exchange, got a lightbox (woot) that I'm starting to play with (results below!), as well as the DVD set for Tales of the Gold Monkey, a fun show that I loved as a kid when it was on, and probably helped spark my loves for pulp adventure and flying boats. 

Late over the last few nights I managed to get more painting done on the Ogryn and hit them with washes.

Scythiak Usurpation - WIP Techno-barbarian heavy weapons nearing completion

The techno-barbarian lascannon and mortar teams are also nearing completion.  Same as with the rest of the platoon, just need to decide on if want more levels of shading or if this is enough, and basing.

Imperial Armour 10 Badab War and Space Sharks rumor info

First of all, off topic kudos to Todd for his recent win in a Toys for Tots 40K tournament, and kudos to the event for collecting for the cause.  Todd is the relatively local Tyranid player I played at our recent Games Day, and you can hear about the Toys for Tots event over at Deleted from Imperial Records.

But on to the meat of the post, the blood in the water.  White_Lancer was kind enough to drop some plausible-sounding rumors in the comments of my last Space Shark related post, and I thought I'd put them up here for those who don't subscribe to the comments (lesson is - you should! ;-)  ).  Some interesting stuff regarding IA10 and our favorite marine marines.  I haven't heard these elsewhere, take with the normal grain of salt, but they sound pretty reasonable to me.

White_Lancer said...

Managed to get a sneaky peek at IA10 today. Carcharadons are going to be very popular soon. The mystery terminator in IA9? Well he's the Carchardons Chapter master armed with lightning claws and a chainfist which he can split his attacks between. Originally a conversion piece he looks to be released at the end of january, the forgeworld boys have been looking at the blogposts on the internet and have been amused that just because the picture is green tinted everyone is jumping at him being a mantis warrior or one of the sons of medusa. there are no plans to release Mk1 Termie armour with IA10 but its on the to do list. Chapter tactics wise he allows you to replace combat tactics with Furious charge however afterwards if the unit destroys another in close combat it becomes subject to rage. Fluffwise the carchardons are a crusade type fleet however they are constantly crusading and essentially "living off the land" not coming back in for resupply and are essentially the Imperial boogeyman. Fluff also suggests that the Raven Guard are their progenitors and that the founders were the monsters created by Corax in an effort to rebuild the Ravens after Istvaan V

sonsoftaurus said...@White_Lancer - Thanks for the info. Hmm. The rules sound OK, but I don't think I'd want to take a termie HQ to get them. At first blush not really a fan of the background, with Raven Guard/monster forebears, but after reading the whole bit may change my mind. Do you know any update on when IA10 will be up for order/release?

White_Lancer said...

Should be up for preorder soon and shipping on 10th January with an A1 poster of the navigators warp routes of the badab sector and the reverse with all of the chapters in the engagement

White_Lancer said...

And umm if you don't like the fact you have to take a termie captain then you really won't like that he allows Bolters to be replaced with close combat weapons!

sonsoftaurus said...

Thanks for the date info. The poster with all the chapters sounds ace. FC and CC weapons sounds great. May be worth taking sometimes just for that, but I still doubt I'll end up doing it. If I want FC and assault marine troops I'll just go the Blood Angel route. Glad to see a Shark character model, and fingers still crossed for a FW Shark upgrade pack. Thanks again for coming to share these tasty tidbits!

Edit:

So what do you folks think?  Plausible?  If true do these rumors make it more or less likely for you to pick up Space Sharks/Carcharodons?

Scythiak Usurpation - WIP Techno-barbarian platoon near completion

My time lately hasn't had much in the way of hobby time, but after I get motivated to finish up my last project for the semester I should be able to plunge back in.  I have managed to get a little more work done on the Scythiak for the techno-barbarian infantry platoon - some basic painting and some washes.

I originally planned to use the wood stain on these guys, but I'm liking how they look with just the washes so may stick with that.  I hit them with Devlan Mud all over, and it looked pretty good, but made the skin look a little too grimy and too extremely shaded in the recesses, and a little too dark for the reds.  So I went back over the skin with Ogryn Flesh wash, and hit the big red areas like the horns and shields with Baal Red, which seems to have lightened things up a tad and made shading transitions a little smoother.  With a little time away from them, when I get back I'll decide if I like them enough as-is or if I want to do a little drybrushing then another round of wash or not. 

I like being able to crop pics to show closer looks, but man things just don't look as good up close!  From a normal distance they do look a bit better.  Still, I'm pretty pleased with how they're shaping up.  Next I'll finish up the other techno-barbarian heavy weapons teams and then will probably return to the Ogryn.

 

Space Sharks - Codex: Space Marines potential list

While previously I was exploring Codex: Blood Angels for my upcoming Space Shark army, since I have had my Codex: Space Marines returned I started fiddling around with that book to represent them. 

Whereas my existing Marines (Silver Skulls) are full-on drop pod, and I've looked at full-drop or full-jump lists with the Blood Angels, this time around I've tried out a much more mixed list, including many of the things I think are cool or could be nifty.

Space Sharks (Codex: SM) 1850pt Task Force 

HQ
Captain on Bike, Lightning Claw/Combi-flamer, meltabombs, artificer armor
(180)
I wanted to include some bikes, so decided to use the captain on bike to make a biker squad Troops for some fast scoring units.  Some extra bling thrown on when I had some points left over.

(HQ) Command Squad (Apothecary + 4 vets)
Bikes, Company Champion, 2xFlamers, Lightning Claw, 4xMeltabombs
(265)
 Since have Captain on bike, may as well give him some company, and I think I'd like to do up an Apothecary on a bike.  If I start swapping things out or dropping to 1500, this is likely one of the first things to go due to being so expensive for so few guys.


Troops
8 Bikes+Attack Bike w/Multi-Melta, 2xPlasmaguns, Sgt PF
(320)
I know conventional wisdom would have meltameltamelta, but I thought Relentless fast moving plasmaguns could be fun and useful.  Might be better with the Command Squad due to FNP, but with different roles may keep weapons as they are.  With the Captain on a bike, this can be another scoring unit (or two if Combat Squad them).  

Troops
10xTactical Marines, Meltagun, Multi-melta, Powerfist, Drop Pod
(235)
I like pods, and it's another version of mobility.

Troops
10xTactical Marines, Flamer, Missile Launcher, Powerfist
Rhino with Dozer Blade and Hunter-Killer Missile
(245)
Another mobility option and more scoring.

Elite
Ironclad Dreadnought, Meltagun/Heavy Flamer, Chainfist, Drop Pod
(180)
Podding distraction, and dreads are just cool.  Probably the pod that comes in turn 1 to drop among the enemy and draw attention while rest of the army zips into position.

Fast Attack
10xAssault Marines, 2xFlamers, Powerfist
(235)
Yet another version of mobility, and way to get a bunch of chainswords in.  

Fast Attack
Land Speeder Typhoon - Multi-melta, Typhoon Missile Launcher
(100)
Look cool, shoot something then die.

Heavy Support
Whirlwind, Dozer Blade
(90)
Indirect fire can be handy, and long-range cover ignoring blasts can be annoying to some armies.  Not amazing vs. mech, but neither is the army as a whole.  Dozer blade mainly to help it go around tank shocking in case it takes a weapon destroyed result. 

1850 total

Worst GW model product ever, and redemption

People may talk about the old Dark Eldar figures, the metal Possessed CSM, Nagash or others as the worst figures GW ever produced,  but for me it's the frikkin' clear flying stands that stand out as the worst.  They're so pitiful that they break off in plastic Tau drones.  A DRONE.  It's not like I'm trying to balance a Titan or something on there, give me a break!  No, not that kind of a break, GAH!

But help is on the way! In case you may have missed it during all the recent hoopla about the new Dark Eldar models themselves, the flitty ones like Raiders and Reavers came with another little surprise - redesigned flying bases.  I don't have any myself yet, but I'm glad they're here.


Rather than the little peg on the old ones that frequently breaks, these look more sturdy and the ball and socket design should also help avoid breakage plus allow for easier cool angling of the models.  While you could always come up with a custom solution (I used to drill bigger holes in my gravtanks to have them sit further down on the pole in a more stable spot), magnetize, etc. it's nice to have a pretty good stock option.  They also had (have?) fiddly little multi-piece ball and socket bits that fit on the regular stand, but those were at least as bad about breaking.  The new ones look like they bypass much of the fiddlyness. 

Unfortunately the new posts won't work with older models without modification (ie make an appropriate socket for the ball to fit in) and I don't think GW is selling the new ones directly yet.  Hopefully as time goes on and other skimmers and jetbikes get redesigned they'll all share the new ball and socket format, so someday regular Eldar, Tau, Land Speeders and others can all join in on the fun.  It's only taken a couple of decades to get to this point, hopefully the follow-up will be a bit faster!

Scythiak Usurpation - WIP Techno-barbarian heavy weapons, Yarrick, Eldar

As I mentioned in the last post, I forgot to take pictures of the heavy weapons teams I had also been working on a bit for the Scythiak.  I have corrected that oversight; here they are:

Lascannons

Mortars

Heavy Bolters

The Heavy Bolter guys are based off of Ox from the Last Chancers.  I'm planning on just having them alone on the 60mm base with some accessories, as 2W 2A bad mammajammas.  Also planning to have them detachable so I can take one to use as a Sgt. Harker stand in if needed.

A while back I got partway through a Commissar Yarrick figure, painted to match my Merkans but haven't finished him yet.  I also recently got another one that I plan to eventually traitorize.

I also picked up some Eldar figures the other day that have a long history.

Way back at the dawn of the millennium, when I was first getting back into 40K I got a huge Eldar deal.  While I was building Space Marines and Chaos Marines, my friend Pat was interested in Eldar, so I sold him most of the lot, and he used it for a while before dropping out of the game.  The mass of Eldar then eventually made its way to Nathan, then some of it made its way to John, and now these guys made their way back to me.  Some is also ending up with Ed, to reinforce the Ed-dar.  Ten years later some small part of that huge lot has found its way back to me.

The reason I got them is that I have some ideas of doing an Eldar Corsair force, combining Craftworld and Dark Eldar figures down the road.  I'll often do this, picking up a little bit here and there over a long time while I'm building and painting another army.  I'll be painting one, getting stuff for another, fiddling with lists for others to decide what to get for a third.  Once I get done painting one, every army moves up a slot in the pipeline.  It'll probably be quite a while before these guys see paint, so don't hold your breath for them.

Scythiak Usurpation - WIP Techno-barbarian platoon

I've been getting some progress in on the Scythiak, working on the techno-barbarian platoon.  They're still a good ways from being finished but I thought I'd share some pics of where they stand now.

Here's "PapaJJ" and his platoon command squad.

One squad:

Oops, forgot that one guy's boots.

Second squad:

And our MEq (Marbo Equivalent), Khonan:

I've also done a little work on the lascannon and mortar teams, but they're not quite as far along and I forgot to take pics of them anyways.  Hopefully I'll get them all to a good stage by the next time I update progress on this lot!