Hobby Diary 06/11/2016

Lee:

Hobby wise this hasn't been a particularly eventful week. It has mostly comprised preparing projects for the rest of the month and re-jiggling my projects. It is irritating when you have a plan but new things shove the items you had wanted to get done out of the way. 

Preparation wise this week I constructed a 500pt Scourge fleet. I enjoyed putting these models together. Even though all the Scourge ships have the same basic hull the additional parts really do set them apart, at least as far as the frigates are concerned. My fleet is mostly frigates organised into Groups that have specific purposes with a light cruiser along to provide a bit of heavier firepower. Now that I have had a chance to read through the fleet list it is easier to recognise the ships as their individual classes instead of a succession of weirdly shaped vessels. I'll discuss my fleet when Allan and I get our first game in, I don't want to tip him off to my plan.

I intend to spray all these ships metal with silver along the tips of the protrusions. Over this I will apply washes. Then once these are dry I will pick out the detail traditionally. I will be paying particular attention to the unique parts of each ship so I can easily identify them on the board. Rather than go for the usual purple and greens that the display fleet are painted I will be looking at sea creatures for inspiration.

I was disappointed that I did not find Khalida during a search of my carry cases but determined to complete a Warhammer Fantasy model this month I chose a Tomb King instead, with a Scarab Swarm base as an optimistic hanger on that may also get done at the same time. This is going to follow the same method as the Liche Priest from last month, paint the gold, skin and bandages then brown wash the lot and then highlight and pick out the details.

The thing I made the most progress on this month was my Sicaran. As a main Word Bearer unit this is painted red but with charcoal black sections echoing the shoulder pads of my Astartes. I am making good progress so far and hope to be done by the end of next week though you know how it is with plans and reality matching up.

The first project that looks like it will be completed this month is my random Emperor's Children. The Emperor's Children for 40K are one of my oldest armies and I have quite a bit painted. This model found its way to the window sill when I was unpacking and was left behind so that when I started to paint it was to hand. Wanting to expand on this army rather than junk it I have painted this Marine as a test bed for my newer scheme. The main change is changing the banding from the same blue as the weapons to green. I think it works and will make sure that any new or touched up units match this guy. As it stands there are just a couple of details to finish and then to base and he is done.

As far as November's plan goes below are the changes. 

Definite

Word Bearers Sicaran

Emperor's Children Marine

Queen Khalida Tomb King

Planned

Scourge ships

Squats

Warrior Nation Braves

Khalida is out and the Tomb King is in and the Squats have been relegated to the sidelines to make room for five Warrior Nation Braves for Wild West Exodus. I have all the paints I need now to do justice to their skin so these will be my test bed. I had intended only to paint one but there is a new hobby challenge beginning on the Wild West Exodus Facebook groups and the minimum requirement for month one is five Hired Hands. Whether they get completed or not really depends on how long the Sicaran takes but if I keep up the pace I have set thus far then I should meet my deadline.

AL:

Like Lee, i have had a pretty quiet week comparatively after last week's mad rush. It's mostly been back to watching Star Trek Voyager while building cultists. I did get my UCM fleet undercoated though, ready for the airbrush, i've undercoated them black and i'll drybrush them with grey and white in an attempt to pre-highlight them before I give them the base coat. It's all a bit experimental at this stage. Still, i'm looking forward to getting them done and of all things, Call of Duty Infinite Warfare has been a major influence with the ships in that game being rather well realised and giving me a few ideas for my UCM. 

So like I said, in the meantime i've been adding to the ranks of the Cultists, i've actually finished all my Overkill sprues and though I have a box of neophytes (which are to be assembled with all the options and intermixed with my normal squads, it's been the Cadians that i have been working on this week. 

So one of the main things i have realised of late is that the Hybrids are FAR superior to the Cadian models. OK there are ten years between them but you can see every single one of those years when comparing kits. The Cadians are crude, oddly proportioned with massive mouldlines (thank the Emperor - Beloved by all - for the mould line remover tool) and just don't go that well together. Well overdue an upgrade i would say! After spending as much time cleaning the model as it took to assemble a dozen cultists I started to assemble them. I wanted to try to improve the way they looked a bit and in all honesty the removal of Aquilas and addition of cult bits and heads only goes so far with that. I'll be painting them quite drab so that they don't stand out too much compared to the much more interesting cultist models.

I managed to get three complete squads of ten and with a bit of creative hacking have tried to vary the models up a bit with backpacks and the like though i have to confess i am not absolutely happy with them, it doesn't help that the superior Command kit has a lot of options that the cultists just CAN'T use like powerfist and plasma and melta guns. This variety would have improved the models considerably. Stupid Codex. 

Oh well, never mind, I moved onto the heavy weapon squads, a little bitz order a few weeks ago meant I was in a position to utilise more of the heavy weapons than normal and indeed I actually seem to have all options available which is handy. I do like getting the most out of my kits. The main place I had to be creative was with the missile launchers, they needed a bit of cutting to make them a bit shorter so they look like they could be fired without the need of the tripod. I think i've just about managed that. 

I've also been creative with the hybrid bits. I used Overkill models to utilise as many bits of the sprues as possible and have turned basic Acolytes to make Metamamorphs and a standard bearer. Though the models needed a fair bit of cutting, the conversion is actually fairly simple and I think i have got away with it. 

So that's the cult mostly done! The tanks are yet to do and another box of Neophytes, and i have a commissar from the start collecting box to get creative with - probably double up as another Primus. Oh, and the rest of the Cadian Command, OK the cult is not quite as done as I thought, good thing that we are only on season 3 of Voyager. 

I did also construct a glass cabinet to display my Star Wars Armada fleets, that counts as hobby right? 

Still, i'm casting my mind to other things, (i'm like a hobby magpie) and whilst I try to resist the lure of the wavering post Trump election dollar making a Kickstarter very tempting i'm thinking about what is next. I really want to finish those three busts i started, it shouldn't take too long, a couple of evening sessions maybe, in between i can do my UCM and 30k Ultramarines. As you will see from the picture i have the ventilated spraying station all set up so next time I hope to have much more than just construction done...