No hobby points for my for January

I failed. Some last minute work commitments got in the way of finishing the Angels of Defiance Master. He's nearly done, just needs a little work on the metallics but, as I said, I didn't get my Warhammer Resolution for January done. Didn't finish any other projects before (God help us) Brexit Day rolled around. So, no bonus points and I've lost those ten points for finishing the twelve monthly projects, as well.

When faced with moderate failure there's only one solution:

GO BIGGER! TEMPT FATE WITH EVEN GREATER POTENTIAL FOR FAILURE!

February's Hobby Resolution is going to be to paint an entire Imperial Knight Crusader. That's the one with the battle cannon and the gatling cannon. I got the model cheap on eBay a few years ago and havent so much as touched it until now. Yesterday, I built the big boy and I am so jazzed to get to work on it.

I'm going to be painting the model in the colours of House Cadmus, which is the colour scheme from the box art above. I love their background as, basically, fox hunting toffs on an epic scale (well, a 28mm scale). Its a relatively simple colour scheme but striking, its also not predominantly dark red or black which I'm doing my best to avoid right now out of sheer fatigue (Deathwatch, Word Bearers, Cult of the Bladed Cog Genestealer Cults, red and black are FAR too common in Warhammer 40,000).

A few other... not “goals” but intentions for the month include aciding bathing my Blackstone Fortress Traitor Guard because I have a much better idea of how to paint them than I did originally; building some of the Mechanicus kits I got for Christmas; and, choosing a Chaos Legion for the very small number of Chaos Marines who'll be part of my Lost and the Damned army.

So, let's march hoprefully towards inevitable failure...

The Sprawl Addressed (finished models)

I looked at my hobby diary before writing this and it turns out I haven't finished a model since the 6^th of March. No wonder I needed a week of intensive hobbying to get myself back in the groove. Admittedly, I didn't get anywhere near finishing the small legion of models on the mantelpiece but plenty did get done. I started last week with thirty-one models and I finished sixteen. That is not bad, especially as one of them is a Lord Of War choice (admittedly one of the smaller ones, but still).

What's more they're all for the same project: the many headed beast of detachments that is my Deathwatch army.

First up we have Kill-Team “Omen” (Rubicon Command, Watch Company Primus, First Squad) under Sergeant Mori Pellos of the Star Phantoms:

 

The chapters, from left to right, are the Dark Hands, Star Phantoms, Exorcists, Black Dragons, Angels Sanguine and Marines Malevolent (the Marine Malevolent was already painted and is just joining his completed squad here). Basically, I wanted to make a team composed of some of the less trustworthy chapters in the Imperium simply because the shoulder pads in the official kit tend more towards the upstanding and heroic sorts (plus the Dark Angels). I particularly enjoyed the chance to include a mutated Space Marine in the form of the Black Dragon with his horned head (taken from the Chaos Space Marine Raptors kit, by the way).

For anyone wondering, the shoulder pads come from the online store of Shapeways trader POP Goes The Monkey. They're 3D-printed and require a little cleaning before painting (hence why the paint looks a little thick on these ones, I didn't know that when I started them). As you can see, the detail fidelity is fantastic even if some striations from the printing process remain visible through the paint.

Also for the main body of the Deathwatch detachment itself is Terminator Kill-Team “Gauntlet” (Watch Company Secundus, First Squad) under Sergeant Dane Ixion of the Minotaurs:

The chapters from the line-up, left to right, are: Red Hunters, Brazen Skulls, Dark Hunters, Minotaurs and Angels Of Redemption. Again, shoulder pads from POP.

I also finished the first unit for my Adeptus Mechanicus detachment which will operate as allies (...ish) to the Deathwatch of Rubicon Command.

I've painted these Sicarians in the red armour and black robes of Stygies VIII, a Forge World often censured by Mars for an unhealthy interest in xenotech. Rubicon Command uses them for technical analysis and fabrication and the Stygies mob use the Deathwatch to get their hands on all sorts of proscribed alien technology.

And, finally, the big fella: an Imperial Knight Armiger Waglaive from House Cadmus:

I'll be honest, the main reason I picked this colour scheme was because it was simple. I do like the House's background which mainly revolves around them being effectively mounted hunters more than mechanised heraldic knights but the fact I could use two principal colours (silver and camo green) with just a little yellow and black mixed in for variety. Whether I'll have them siding with the Mechanicus in my background or standing for good (… ish) Imperial values I've yet to decide. Cadmus aren't linked with Stygies VIII in the background, their local forge world is/was Gryphonne IV which is convenient since that world and an awful lot of Cadmus Knights fell to the Tyranids.

All in all, not a bad week's work.

Hobby Goals for May

One

Build Forgebane

I definitely need to build these models. I've been painting the first of the Armigers and the Cryptek for the last week and its lit a fire under me to work on these factions. Unfortunately, those aren't just the only models I've been painting they're the only ones from the set I've even built.

Time to get a little construction going.

Two

Decide what I want to do for Necrons

Between my own Forgebane and the Necron half I bought cheap off a friend who just wanted the Mechanicus models, I have the basis for a decent size Necron army. I just need to make a few decisions. My own colour tests having failed I've fallen back on the utterly gorgeous Novokh Dynasty colour scheme so that's decided (and oh so easy to paint).

For a start I need to decide what to do with all those multi-purpose kits. Two units of Immortals with different weapons load outs or one of Immortals and one of Deathmarks? Triarch Praetorians or Lychguard or both?

So, I need to go through the Codex to see what the Novokh background suggests and how their bespoke faction rules work and prepare an army list.

Three

Finish something for the Deathwatch

I have a lot of things just sitting half-finished for my Deathwatch and there's a new Codex on the way. It would be nice to have a thing or two battle ready when that drops.

This Week's Project: Baldrick 40,000

I said before that I was going to clear the backlog a bit by not buying any new models umtil I'd painted the contents of Forgebane. In my defence I have been a good boy and held to that. The case for the prosecution is that so far my progress on Forgebane has been to basecoat the Cryptek. The bugger of it all is that as soon as I swore off buying new models I found myself really, really inspired towards the Deathwatch and now I desperately want to buy more Kill-Teams.

So I need to make headway on Forgebane. This week's project, therefore, is to build and paint one of the Knight Armigers aka the models I bought this set for in the first place.

As to colour scheme: I spent a while trying to come up with my own colour scheme but, ultimately, nothing I scribbled down appealed to me as much as the deep forest green of House Cadmus:

I know I'm usually one for bold, bright colour schemes but I like the moody shade of green and how it contrasts both with the black and the brighter yellow. I just like green in general, really, and it'll make a nice change from the endless sea of black and red I've been painting recently.

I also like their background. Their homeworld of Raisa is infested with Beastmen and every year the Knights gather together, get into their war machines and engage in a huge cull. The knight who makes the most kills becomes the leader of the household for the next year. They also have a convenient xenos-related grudge having lost the better part of their fighting strength during the Tyranid invasion of Gryphonne IV which is useful for a force that will be allied to my Deathwatch, at least for the moment.

This will also be the first Lord Of War I've ever painted, a whole part of the game that I've been ignoring for editions opening up to me. Fun times.

The Knight Armiger

I have to admit, this little fellow is making me consider an Adeptus Mechanicus army again. Now, I love Imperial Knights (and Empire Knights and Bretonnian Knights and Cold One Knights and all the other knights) but I have to admit that the Armiger is a lot closer to what I imagined when I read Graham McNeill's Mechanicum nearly a decade ago.

That's not a criticism of McNeill (probably the world's foremost Knight fan) but just a reflection of the fact back then Knights were an all-but-forgotten artifact of deep lore and not a thing you could buy in store. So you had Knights as something an unaugmented human woman could keep pace with and have a chat with the pilot at the same time.

(If I'm mis-remembering that scene, my apologies, it has been a few years).

According to the Warhammer Community post about them you can take them in squadrons, the first Lord Of War choice that can be taken like that. They're built for hunting, basically, softening up enemy vehicles and engines before the bigger Knights come in to finish them off.

Imperial Knights now have their own version of Mounted Yeomen, which I rather like. I also like that the melta weapon is actually called a thermal spear. It looks fast, too, with the back-jointed legs.

I do hope it has an alternative head. I like the one in the example but it matches the Mechanicus head the main knight has and I'd like one to match the “noble” head which I prefer (even though I am considering these as part of a Mechanicus force).

A Tzeentchian Knight (in theory)

I actually came up with this idea for someone else's benefit. I was in Games Workshop the other day and one of the staffers and I started talking about conversion ideas. He was looking for a project and was thinking of doing something with the Imperial Knight Crusader. My suggestion? Tzeentchian Renegade Knight by hybridising the Knight with a Heldrake. The thing is, as expensive as it is (I was suggesting this idea to someone with staff discount), I think it would look amazing and I'm quite tempted to try it.

So here's how I think it would work:

"I am the (K)night!"

The idea is to use parts from the Heldrake sprue to make the Knight look like a mechanical Lord of Change. Replace the Knight's head with the bird head from the Heldrake, most likely on the long sinuous neck in the middle of this sprue...

… which should change the profile of the model considerably. I'll dryfit that just to be sure it won't look too ridiculous. Also on that sprue, centre top, are two shoulder pad things that, with a little cutting and filling, might well fit on top of the Knight's shoulder pads for extra Chaos iconography.

Also of use from the Heldrake are its wings, which I think can be spaced along the rear of the Knight's upper carapace and down its back, and its talons which I intend to add to the Knight's toes to make them more Avian. I'm also going to see if I have any plastic Marks of Tzeentch from the Chaos Vehicle Accessory Sprue knocking around. I should, I've only ever used the Nurgle and Chaos Undivided stuff from those sprues in the past. For sure I have the large Rubric of Ahriman that comes with the Thousand Sons Rubric Marines, which should fit well on the shoulder-mounted heraldry shield.

Now, even using a discount store like Darksphere (who are great, by the way) this'll set me back about a hundred pounds but it will look so good once finished that I am genuinely tempted. So, I'm going to take a couple of days to think about it, maybe work on those Rubric Marines to get the colour scheme right in my head and come back to it.

It would look awesome, though.