To convert or not to convert...

I attended the 25th anniversary celebrations at GW Liverpool on saturday, and managed to grab one of the limited edition Crimson Fists (seriously fast sellers, within 10 minutes of the store opening every single one was gone from the shelves). Opening it up in store i was a) relieved that it was a decent cast, no bubbles or other Finecast woes and b) awed by the sculpt, the photo's really don't do it justice. But...

In it's released form i'd never use it. I don't collect Crimson Fists, i can't really afford to start another army just to use the miniature and to be honest the Fists don't interest me that much as an army.
So that left me with two options. One paint it as a Crimson Fist and have it sit and gather dust in my display cabinet, or two convert it into a Dark Angel.

At first the second option seemed like heresy. Convert a limited edition miniature? Am i mad!?! but the more i thought about the less crazy it seemed. There is very little on the actual marine itself that indicates its a Crimson Fist, one fist icon on its greave and a fist icon on his backback. So getting rid of those would be easy. I'm not too fond of the beaky helmet either, so that would be no loss.
And ultimately, i didn't plan on ever sell the miniature, so it's irrelevant if it would lower its worth to some by changing it.

So last night, i broke out the craft knife and superglue, took a deep breath and began...

And this is the result, a couple of cuts, a change of bits and Crimson Fist becomes Dark Angel. He'll be painted up as the Master of the 3rd Company. Now i just need to think of a suitable name for the guy.






Feel free to leave comments and or death threats for desecrating a limited edition miniature

Regards,
Your friendly neighbourhood Spider-pope.

2010 Retrospective Part 1

With the first decade of the 21st Century coming to a close (speaking of which, where's our jetpacks? Pull your finger out Science!) i've decided to do a series of (ir)regular posts with a backwards looking slant towards my hobby activity of the last year or so.

I've decided to begin with the project that directly led me to resurrect my defunct blog and start posting updates again. On a personal note it's also a project that marked the beginning of my treatment for depression and the slow improvement of my mental state and personal life. It is my Dark Angels.

I'm quite pleased with how the army has progressed in terms of looks, although not with the rate at which i've been turning them out. Numerous distractions and procrastinations have led to a big slowdown in the rate i'm getting them done, not least financial restrictions (if any millionaires are reading this, feel free to make a donation towards their completion) but still work is progressing.
The army is also one where i've tried to further my painting abilities. The bases are the first time i've used resin parts and the armour is my first attempt at edge highlighting and i'm quite pleased with how its gone. There have been a few mis-steps along the way, the tactical squad sergeant in particular doesn't look quite right and will likely be replaced in the new year.

Future plans are to expand the army into a tabletop force and get the blasted things painted. Deathwing are high on my list of want-to-buys with a Belial conversion on my to-do list. Hopefully the new year will increase my finances and get me back on the Dark Angel horse. With any luck i'll get the force finished by the time a new Dark Angels codex is release in 2039, shortly after the conclusion of Bill Oddie's tyrannical Bird-based reign of Terror.

Ravenwing Revisited

You may be forgiven for thinking that i'd abandoned my Dark Angels in favour of painting more of those lovely new sadistic Dark Eldar, however i've actually returned to painting the boys in dark green this last week and made more progress in getting the Ravenwing units i've collected so far painted up.

So on the painting table at the moment are a normal Ravenwing biker and his Sergeant. They are both still very much work in progress but i hope to have them finished by the end of next week, at which point i'll take a few army shots to show how the force is progressing.

In the run up to Christmas, my spending on the hobby decreases quite a bit. I have two kids you see, so any parents reading this will more than understand how expensive the holidays are and how little cash there is spare. However his year this is something of an advantage, since i cant afford to buy shiny new models i've got no choice but to paint up the stuff i've already got so the piles of grey may actually decrease over the next few weeks. With the gaming side of things also greatly reduced for the next month or so, it gives me an opportunity to return to the veterans night in Jan with a fully painted army for once, at least thats the goal anyway.

A Small Update

A small update on my painting efforts this week. I've continued with my Dark Angels this week along with a few bits for my Grey Knights, Daemons and Blood Angels.
I've added some edge highlights to the Dark Angels armour, as it was looking rather flat. This is the first time i've attempted such highlighting on space marines, so any advice in the comments would be greatly appreciated.

My daemons have received a Daemon prince to lead them in Fantasy and to add a little heft to the army on the 40k side of things. The Daemon prince kit is an absolute joy to assemble and i fully intend to add another to my collection, this time using the 40k components.

The Grey Knights are part of my effort to finally finish off that army, hopefully before they get an update next year. I've rather neglected this army the last couple of years, which is a shame as they are beautiful sculpts, some of the best GW have every produced.

And last but not least is the first finished Sanguinary guard from my Blood Angels. As ive mentioned elsewhere in the blog i've been repainting my Blood Drinkers as Blood Angels, the Sanguinary Guard however originate from a separate army attempt. I have plans to eventually field an army of them, led by Dante, often known as the 'Dantewing' or 'Blingwing' on various interweb forums. This is one of those projects that has gotten away from me somewhat that i always mean to get back to, only to be distracted. Anyhow comments and criticism and advice are always welcome.

Picture Update

Slightly later than promised, i've taken a few more pictures of the latest work to be complete on my Dark Angels- the painted Flamer wielding biker and a few foot-slogging Dark Angels, the first of six planned tactical squads.

I've aimed to harken back to the earlier Rogue Trader idea of Marines for this particular biker. Back in the old days, Marines were far less monastic than nowadays, with many sporting graffiti and xenos weapons. Rather than go full slog and give him a shuriken catapult, i've added a little bit of graffiti to his bike and used the space wolf head. Fluff wise i see this particular Battle-Brother as a bit of a wild card, more unruly than his brethren with only his skills with a flamer keeping him from getting his mind scrubbed. No doubt this has also prevented him from rising any further than the Ravenwing within the myriad circles of the Dark Angels.

As you can no doubt see i've gone with the Dark Angels veteran kit for the standard infantry, with black robes rather than bone. Why you ask? Well i wanted my basic troops to stand out from all the other Space Marine armies out there, and i wanted to use the excellent veterans kit without having to use veterans in the army itself as they don't really fit with my interpretation of the Dark Angels organisation. Similarly you will notice that i've gone for bone-white armour for the Veteran Sergeant rather than bone coloured robes. Again this was due to something that has niggled at me since Codex Angels of Death - a member of the Inner Circle has to pass through the Deathwing first, recolouring their armour to bone-white. The colour scheme GW went with suggests that afterwards they would then change their armour back to green, which seems to me to be rather disrespectful to the concept of the armour colour being a memorial to the bravery of past Deathwing members.

So i've kept the armour bone-white, with Dark Angels green robes and will do so for future character i paint. Unfortunately i made this decision after varnishing Sammael, so he's still in his black Ravenwing armour. If i ever replace him with the Jetbike version i will be following this new scheme, until then he's a disrespectful sod.

I've got a few details to finish off on the sergeant before putting together another bolter armed brother and another biker. I'm also planning on continuing my repaint of my Blood Drinkers and Grey Knights, the results of which i'll endeavour to post on the blog too.

Finally Some Pictures!

After a weekend of cursing my fortunes i've finally got a working digital camera and can now display the start of my Dark Angels army. You'll note that i said Dark Angels and not Ravenwing, this is because i decided over the last few days that i'd expand my options to the full Dark Angels list and not only that but begin a huge endeavour and attempt to collect at least a full battle company's worth of Dark Angels.

Now given my Magpie tendencies this is far easier said than done but hey i might as well try to focus on one army now and again.
Anyway here are the first few pictures of my Scions of the Lion.

First shown is the model i am using to represent the Master of the Ravenwing, Sammael. I've gone for the Landspeeder option for two reasons: I want something with a bit of resilience to lead the force, and second i'm a cheap skate and didnt want to fork out another 25 quid on the jetbike version.

Underneath the Master is the first model i painted for the army, an attack bike armed with a multi-melta to give me a bit of tank killy-ness.

And last but not least is the next model on the to paint list, a flamer equipped biker. I used a spare heavy imperial guard flamer to give him something hefty to purge the fallen with. I also used a Space Wolf head (Heresy!) to make him look a bit more aggressive than the standard Dark Angel. My reasoning is he's been recruited from a Hive world and is a tad less stoic than the usual Dark Angel.
Anyway Comments and Criticisms welcome as usual. I should make some progress on the army over the next few days, including some Dark Angels on foot hopefully.

New Blog start and a new army.

Greetings and apologies to anyone who actually reads this blog. Apologies because its been many a month since i last updated it.

This is due to a couple of reasons, primarily because i've been diagnosed with severe depression a few months ago. Since then i've moved house away from several of the reasons behind the depression (utter scum for neighbours for one example) and started a nice course of happy pills.

Part of the symptoms of depression, for those fortunate not to have suffered from it, is the lack of will to carry out activities that you once enjoyed. Hence my painting and posting took a severe nosedive over the last year or so, resulting in a defunct blogs and more than one aborted paint log on Warseer.

Now that the move is complete however and i'm on said course of happy pills, i've decided to make a fresh start. Where in the past this blog was mostly all over the place in terms of topics it's now going to be focused on wargaming almost exclusively, with the occasional ramble onto other subjects if my magpie brain latches onto them.
And with this new start i've decided to start (another) new army: Ravenwing. I've been planning a Ravenwing army since way back in 1996, when i was knee high to a grasshopper and had just received 'Codex:Angels of Death' for a Christmas present. Having also received a Tactical Squad and a Box of Death Company, my longings for an all bike force were supressed, since i'd decided on Blood Angels.

Fast forward a few years and GW released the first Ravenwing army set, for £100 if i remember correctly and again the longings were stirred but again repressed as i was but a penniless Secondary School student with a paper round providing me with a meagre income.

Then almost a dozen years later, Codex:Dark Angels arrives, with a new Ravenwing Battalion box and those forgotten urges were once more dragged into the light. But again i put it off, until finally with this fresh new move to Huyton i've given in to temptation and forked out fifty quid on the box set. Thankfully this was money given to me by my fantastic Grandparents as a birthday present, so my housemate and former missus restrained herself from forcibly castrating me.

For those unfamiliar with the set, it gives you six bikes, an attack bike, a landspeeder and a feth load of bits to upgrade them into Ravenwing goodness. With my income still a tad low (any Lottery winners reading this, please consider sending me a gift) i've decided to go the landspeeder route for the Master of the Ravenwing, when i get around to assembling him that is. That is the other decision i've made for the army - i'll be building a model, painting it fully, before assembling the next. This should prevent it from joining the hordes of grey miniatures that adorn my shelves.

So far i've finished the attack bike, i should have some pictures up soon-ish along with pictures of the next model to be assembled - the Master's Landspeeder.