2nd Edition Army Painting Challenge Month 4

 

Hi folks,

The challenge is in full swing at the moment. Having worked on my larger units in the early months, I am now left with a couple of characters and the odd vehicle. April saw me adding to my Ravenwing force with an Attack bike and two bikers. All of the new models are equipped with powerfists, which is great for hit-and-run attacks against enemy vehicles and provides a bit of a sting if they get caught in close combat.

Multimeltas are stonkingly powerful in 2nd Edition, making Attack Bikes a really fun unit to bring to the tabletop. The two bikers are from the very start of 3rd Edition and are in MkVIII errant armour, which I absolutely love.

In my first game with them, the bikes didn't fare so well. It was a bit of an uneven match-up against two Zoanthropes, one of which used Ultimate Force to sling out a Warp Blast that destroyed two bikes in one hit. The others joined my Assault Squad in lobbing krak grenades at the Hive Tyrant. Needing 4s to would, I managed to roll seven 2s [sigh]. The Attack Bike took out a Maleceptor transport bug on the first turn, but both the gunner and driver were eaten by spiders (a common threat in the campaign we are running).

My Librarian and Assault Squad did not fair much better. After a good round of close combat, knocking the Tyrant down to 3 wounds with his Force Sword, he was killed in the last turn by the his enemy's Bonesword. In that round I rolled three 1s (fumbles, also affectionately known as "wombles" back in the day). Having the Librarian's Conversion Field get burned out by the Tyrant's Voltage Field earlier was particularly galling, as blinded Tyranids are much easier to fight!

Below is a better show of my Librarian, with some spiders that I painted up for the challenge. They are literally just some rubber spiders from the shops, with a coat of paint and some tufts to make them look truly bizarre. In the campaign we are running, spiders can crawl out of the terrain and attack the nearest unit, which just happened to be me most of the time.

I have a lot of crazy plans for the final two months of the challenge, so I am hoping to post a little more frequently with some work in progress shots. I haven't been great at doing that lately; life has been getting on top of me a bit. Until then, I'll sign off with a well deserved stamp!

See you across the table,

Marc

2nd Edition Army Challenge Vol.7

Hi folks,

I'm sorry I haven't been around much the past couple of months. I have kept myself busy with various hobby projects, but free time and energy have been at an absolute premium. Today is the first day of the Easter holidays here in Australia and I am sitting rather shell shocked in my kitchen decompressing. Scrolling through my favourite blogs it started to dawn on me just how long it has been since I recorded any of my efforts. 

So, what's going on?

The Wachtmeister from The Wachtmeister's Patrol and Dr the Viking from Cowabunga Journal  have joined forces to run another 2nd Edition Army Challenge. I am something of a veteran in the challenge now, having participated in every challenge so far, along with a couple of other Aussies (we have become really good mates over the years). I was tempted to give the challenge a miss due to overall fatigue, but before I knew it I was sending off my entry. "It is not in me to withdraw". 

My pledge for the challenge, including a bonus Deathwing Squad.

This year I am working on some mobile units for my vintage Dark Angels, which will include a solid Ravenwing component. I only ever painted one Ravenwing bike back in the day, before 3rd Ed. rolled in and changed how bikes operate significantly. I love how they look, though, so it has been very exciting to re-visit the old paint scheme. 

With two months of the challenge down, I have already painted about 500 points worth of units; things are more expensive in 2nd Ed. (Tactical squads are 300 points). Below are my two progress entries, including a bonus objective marker called "The Grave of the Unknown Rider" and three units from my 2025/26 To-Do list:

To give you some idea of the vibe this challenge has, we even have custom campaign to play (perhaps inspired by the crazy Aussies who keep turning up every year!): The Webs of Uluru

This month I am working on some additional Ravenwing Squadron models and an Attack Bike. Hopefully I can get back into the swing of posting and put up some work in progress soon.

See you across the table,

Marc

TTCombat CHROMA Gothic Ruins: 5 Tips To Not Go Crazy!

 

Hi folks,

A couple of people have posted about this kit from TTCombat and there is a consistent theme to the reviews; it is a grueling process. I have to say, I was also taken aback when the instruction document weighed in at 253 pages. Each piece of terrain has 20-25 instructions, ensuring that only printed surfaces can be seen from each angle This provides you with a great finish, if (and it is a capital IF) you can avoid a number of pratfalls. 

Here are my tips for completing this epic undertaking:

1) Be gentle when removing the pieces from the frame. They have a tendency to delaminate around the printed layer, which is hard like a shell. I pressed patiently with my fingers or a broken piece of frame. Sometimes I ran a hobby knife across the back to loosen some pieces. Some corners still delaminated, but I was able to glue them back together.

2) Sand rough edges and pieces that need to fit in small spaces. I used a course emery board for this, because they are cheap. The pieces have a tight fit, which is again great for the finish, but can require you to use huge amounts of force. Sanding a fraction off the "pegs" makes this so much easier. Just be prepared to be sanding... forever... with this kit.

3) I used a black whiteboard marker to colour over any sanded or exposed MDF, e.g. when gluing two pieces back-to-back you often get a light line between them. It is cheaper than spraying the back of each frame, which I know some other hobbyists have done.

4) The pieces are not numbered, you have to look at the shape carefully in the instructions then find them on one of the frames. One terrain piece will have parts across multiple frames. Many (MANY) pieces are almost identical, but not. Keep an eye out for distances between features on the terrain and the presence of straight or curved lines. Treat it more like a puzzle and you won't go crazy.

5) Sometimes the placement of pieces in the instructions is not clear, but if you look at the next step it shows you how the previous step should look like if done correctly. This is particularly useful for the rare occasions where steps are completely missing! 

At this stage I am falling a bit behind in my posts, mainly due to end of year work shenanigans. Hopefully, over the next couple of days I will be able to post the others terrain pieces I have been working on.

See you across the table,

Marc

DreadTober 2025: Tervigon Complete

 

Hi folks,

Well, DreadTober is done and dusted for another year. It is a challenge that creeps up on me, followed by 4 weeks of bedlam. I find it really cathartic to keep the challenge going, I really do love it and feel so inspired checking out everyone's work. I had a couple of plans for it this year that didn't come to fruition, life just clamped down. Hopefully I can give it a little more of my time and energy in 2026.

I managed to finish my project a little early, though the last night was crazy. The colour shift paint I use has to be painted over a gloss black finish to have the best effect. Just after cracking the paint out my suburb was hit with this insane pulse of humidity, which started messing about with everything I was trying to do. The varnish was frosting, the pigment was pooling and drying weird and glue just would not set. I cranked the air-conditioning in my little room to try and stabilise the conditions, which seemed to help. I still ended up holding the model together for ages waiting for the glue to hold. Here are some photos of the finished beasty:

 

I am pretty happy with how it turned out, especially the Termagant conversion. The photos don't really do the colour shift justice; moving the model around the board is a joy.

My son also managed to finish a project off for the challenge. We had a great time searching for basing materials in our FLGS, and settled on some swampy green clumps. I can't tell you how proud I am after watching him paint this thing over the course of the month. He has a couple more Tau kits to work on; hopefully he keeps this momentum going.

Certainly worth of a big fat stamp, while I stew over what to do next...

See you across the table,

Marc