A late progress update report, and a massive challenge to myself

It is Wednesday already, and I haven't posted on my blog! In my defence, the season has meant a perfect storm of friends visiting, LARP events and work Christmas parties that have left me struggling to find time.

Despite that, I have some small progress. I've started base coating the Secret Weapon bases I bought for my Malifaux Collodi crew, I've repaired the Chainsword on the bodyguard who got broken fighting ClauseIV1918, and I finished another Wicked Doll, leaving only one left to complete!

Looking back, I think I've not done as much painting and modelling as I'd like, so I've decided to take on a nice big challenge to try and motivate me into getting a whole bunch of stuff finished. I've decided to try and take on The Independent Characters' Hobby Progress Challenge 2014.

The premise for this is that between some specific dates - in this case, between 1 February 2014 and 30 November 2014. The challenge this year is to complete a 1,000 point Zone Mortalis force by 30 June 2014, then expand it to a full 2,000 point force by the end of the challenge.

The realisation that I could easily do the challenge without buying a single model - and in fact had a wide choice of what to pick from my unpainted collection has spurred me to knuckle down and get some Guard painted up this year!

There's a bunch more rules about publishing army lists and trying to get a unit a month done, but you should head over to their forums for the full rules. So, it's becoming even more important for me to clear the decks of half finished projects so I can hit 2014 with a bang.

Little parcel in the post

Strategically placed card to obscure my address...

I was very pleased this morning to receive a knock on the door from our postman. I had been expecting a little parcel from Wayland Games after receiving a despatch note. I'd actually ordered these back on 4 November, but unfortunately some of the items had been out of stock and needed ordering from the manufacturer, and took a while to arrive.

I'm also trying to avoid delivering parcels to work any more. They are asking us to cut back on that as it is a perk, and recently some people thought it'd be a bright idea to have a new bike and an ironing board delivered there, among other things. I like that perk for when I need it, so most non urgent parcels can go to my home address!

And here are the contents! A number of Eden blisters from Taban. Not all of them are mine, mind you - several are for my wife's ISC faction.

And here they are - I've got the "Bamaka" bases for my Jokers, and Sim has the "Scrapyard" and "ISC" bases for her killer robots. I'm hoping to get down to some serious painting and modelling over the Christmas break, and as I've prepped up a killer clown for painting, I'm glad these made it before the postal service vanished for the festive season.

Battle Report: How does 40K work again? 1,750 vs Grey Knights

Horusian Inquisitor

A few weeks back, I decided to get back to 40K with a big 1,750 point battle against ClauseIV1918's Grey Knights. It has been a while since we played, and while I've been off playing other, non 40K games, he has still be doing a lot of 40K, although admittedly, much of it has been Kill Team.

Following my rule of causing mayhem wherever possible, I suggested we make the Storm of Magic Arcane Fulcrum to the right of the picture Mysterious Archeotech, although the psyker killing result would only hit psykers, not Brotherhood of Psyker units... And there's a Comm Relay up on the mesa in the centre.

You'll also notice Servo Skulls liberally scattered down the centre of the battlefield. This does not fill me with joy.

I'd thrown together a pretty typical army, and put my Ratlings in my own deployment zone due to the Skulls, while I sent my Storm Troopers off on an outflanking exercise.

And here's the left flank, with my command HQ in the Chimera and some Rough Riders making an outing for the first time in a while. But what's that hiding behind the bunker next to the mesa?

A Vindicare assassin, lurking among the buildings...

The Mysterious Archeotech is a power field generator, you say? Invulnerable saves for everything near it, you say?

It seems the Grey Knights decided that invulnerable saves are lovely things, and they want in on a bit of that action.

The Grey Knights advance, using what little cover is available as best they can...

The long ranged fire from the Grey Knight vehicles manages to detonate the Hellhound, killing one of the Ratling snipers in the ensuing explosion. Storm Bolter fire also causes the squad on the right flank to flee off the board...

The Guard then advance, and ClauseIV1918 suddenly looks a little nervous about the proximity of the Rough Riders to his assassin...

Well, it certainly won't go well for someone...

The Guard advanced, but their combined shooting had practically no effect on the Grey Knights...

The Rough Riders injure the assassin with a laspistol shot before charging, then he was trampled to death by their horses before the lances even strike home... They pull back, awaiting the counter assault. (Given how dangerous that strike was, in hindsight, I should probably have charged both units...

A wider shot showing the state of the left flank at the end of my first turn.

Meanwhile, on the right flank, the Demolisher and the Hydra had successfully wrecked a Razorback, causing the occupants to bail out.

A second assassin. Of course. The first assassin was clearly just a distraction. The Officio Assassinorum is getting smarter...

Grey Knight reserves start pouring onto the battlefield...

I'm not sure what these chaps were up to.

There do seem to be a lot more Grey Knights about, suddenly...

Well, that's really not good, is it?

The firing this round takes out the Leman Russ Demolisher.

While the Callidus assassin completes her mission easily.

A brutal exchange leaves the surviving Rough Riders fleeing for their lives...

A small squad of Storm Troopers arrive from outflanking to see if they can turn the tide.

While the conscripts in the centre provide a timely reminder to the Grey Knights that failings in accuracy of fire can be overcome with volume. Or, as attributed to Stalin, "Quantity has a quality all of its own".

The Dreadnoughts bring down my Valkyrie, leaving a lone survivor pulling himself from the wreckage.

And the return of fire at the Storm Troopers leaves only the sergeant alive.

Despite executing the squad sergeant, the weight of fire on the surviving infantry squad is too much, and they flee.

The Inquisitor makes a concerted effort to punch a tank to death.

Meanwhile, the rest of the Grey Knights move to encircle the surviving Guardsmen.

The assassin and a squad of Grey Knights gun down a large number of conscripts, and charge the survivors.

The combat, unsurprisingly, goes very poorly for the conscripts.

"What's he equipped with?"
"Melta bombs."
"Ah. That could be a problem."

It wasn't. He was kicked to death before he could place a bomb.

The Grey Knights then move to secure the second objective.

The Grey Knight Dreadnoughts hold the centre.

The Inquisitor slowly but surely batters the tank to death by backing off, shooting it, and charging it again...

The Command HQ disembark in as much cover as they can find.

A flank suspiciously empty of living Guardsmen...

And all in all, it looks bleak for the Guard.

The battle was called before I was tabled, but it was a comprehensive thrashing. It is certainly a combination of me being out of practice and ClauseIV1918 having improved his game a lot since we first played! He came in with a definite plan, which worked well. I had no real plan and a smattering of units.

Coming up with a list which has a more comprehensive 'use' may be something to look into. There are definitely more units I want to try and use, but that means I really need to get them assembled and painted! Still, it was a very enjoyable game, for all the kicking I received. I did manage to cause a couple of bloody noses to the Grey Knights - notably one of the squads which was a bit too overconfident about being out in the open, and the Vindicare assassin getting ridden down by the cavalry.

I have a couple of repairs to do, as well - one of the bodyguard's chainswords has come off, and a Rough Rider lance has snapped... That will need to go onto the "to do" list.

Getting Someone Else To Do Your Painting: Squidzilla Ink

After a couple of small "too good to miss" deals turned the "to do" column of my Kanban board to the red of shame, I decided that some of my hobby budget should go towards getting more models painted, instead of making the backlog even worse. This was made doubly important because I knew that the Eavy Metal painting classes I was about to go to would also give me a bunch more half painted miniatures.

Yes, I had decided to dip my toe into the world of paying someone else to paint some of my models - commission painting. It is worth noting that for the sake of marital harmony, I had talked to my wife about this first - given that she is also a commission painter and had not been in favour of such things in the past. However, given her current backlog, she agreed it was fine for me to commission some work outwards.

For the purposes of this experiment, I selected my second Storm Trooper squad. They were ideal for a number of reasons. They had a little bit of awkward base pinning to do that I really wasn't looking forward to. Half had been undercoated by a seller and half were not. Half had been bought from Lesley's Bits Box at Salute 2012, the other half from a variety of low ball bids on ebay.

In addition, as an elite unit, I'd planned on painting them up a bit differently from the Storm Trooper unit I already had painted, and it didn't matter if they looked a little different from the other units I have. In short, they were an excellent unit to try out a new painter on.

The willing guinea pig I selected for this experiment is the chap who runs Squidzilla Ink. He was new to the area, and I met him through Dark Sphere and playing Infinity (I still have a battle report with him to post up at some point). His website is still a work in progress as he's just getting set up, but having seen a few example models both on his site and in person, I decided I was comfortable with handing him some of my models. (He also has an ebay store which will sometimes have models passing through it - worth having a look every now and again!)

It was certainly an odd feeling to be handing someone models and money, rather than handing people models and receiving money! His prices were reasonable, but I will do the very British thing and not go into the detail of how much I paid. Like many painters, he ran to a system of paying a deposit up front, with the remainder being paid on completion of the work.

I gave him the models on a Friday evening, and picked them up the following Tuesday at Infinity night. This was because there was a gap in his schedule, but if you need models painted in a hurry, its entirely possible he'll be able to oblige! I have, sadly, been a little incompetent in my photo taking, and I really need to take the time to take a better photo of them. You may think that they are a little dark, but this was part of my brief, as my Guard army uses a pretty dark set of colours, and I wanted them to fit in.

All in all, I am very happy with both the results of the work, and the service provided. The proprietor of Squidzilla Ink is a craftsman and a gentleman, and I would most definitely recommend his services to others. I am already looking thoughtfully at my backlog trying to work out what else I'd like to get on the table quickly...

This week: A trip to Warhammer World

This weekend, my wife and I pottered up to Warhammer World for two 'Eavy Metal Masterclasses. One was about skin tones, the other about painting metal and also Non Metallic Metal.

We took a long weekend, after checking in to our hotel on the Friday, I pottered over to Warhammer World to kill some time rather than sitting around the hotel looking sad.

I popped up to the miniatures hall to see what had changed. There's plenty of updates there regularly, so its worth multiple trips. I spotted a new exhibition of the history of Citadel miniatures, and knowing that Orylgg and his readership would appreciate it, I took a bunch of photos. Some lucky folk may have already seen them, but I'm pretty sure not everyone has. When I've finished editing the photos and cleaning them up, I'll put up a post with them all in.

I also took a few shots to show what's currently "on campaign" as that can sometimes help predict what's going to be released at some point in the future - but I don't have enough data yet to say how far into the future! That will go up in a separate rumour post in a while too...

Then there was the painting classes themselves. The first one, on skin and faces, used the Savage Orc Boss and the Dark Elf Sorceress as models. I'm really happiest with the Savage Orc, although I know what I want to fix on his face (his lips don't blend enough back to the green), he was the model I felt most under control with and that I was learning at a nice easy pace.

The Dark Elf Sorceress was next. It turns out pale skin is really not my strong point, and I had quite a lot of problems with this one. I stopped for a bit towards the end, and also went and did my own thing a little bit with the eyes, as it was something I was not particularly good at. I definitely want to practice eyes in the future, but right now, my brush control really isn't up to it...

Sim gave me a little bit of a talking to after the class, quite rightfully. I should have paid more attention even when I was getting stuck, and not given up and stopped. I resolved on the second day to pay closer attention and try and keep going even when things got super hard.

The Chaos Lord, on the start of Day 2, was relatively easy. The blade was a bit harder, and I've still not got it right, but I'm not too concerned about that. It is, effectively, trying to do NMM but using metals, and while it will look awesome when I work it out, I've not worked it out yet...

Then, after lunch, Sanguinor. Non Metallic Metals. I had a suspicion this was going to be Very Hard, and I really tried to focus on not getting frustrated and stopping... It was incredibly hard! I had about an hour and a half when I totally forgot how to blend, and I felt like a toddler finger painting and splodging paint on at random.

I ended up redoing some parts of the model four or five times, but I ended up with this, which I'm pretty pleased with. I know what the next steps are to make it even better, and at some point I will do them - but after two full days of painting, there reached a point where I tried to do a next step, ruined something I was particularly proud of, and had to spend half an hour fixing the bit I'd just done!

All in all, I will definitely be doing more Masterclasses when I have the money, but I may think twice about doing two in a weekend again. I am definitely enthused about painting right now, and really wanting to set some time aside to get things done. I've also proved I can paint for five or six hours in a day if I don't have distractions and actually sit down and do it.

While the classes are quite pricey, I would say that given what you pick up and how much you improve, they are worth it just for that. The fact that paint is thrown in along with the brushes also helps take the edge off it. A photo of quite how much stuff I've come home with without slipping up at the store or buying any Forge World will follow in a while.

Unsurprisingly, with four free figures, my work in progress charts are not going to be very happy... Time to start using this painting motivation for good!