2020/2021 Hobby Season Review

 

Hi folks,

At the start of this hobby season I wrote a monumental to-do list, with the hope that I would get a fraction of the things done. A lot of my energy was poured into the 2nd Edition Army Challenge, which has to be one of the best things I have ever done in the hobby. The camaraderie between the challengers is fantastic and the work being done is just amazing on a daily basis. As a result, a lot of my 2nd Edition projects have been finished. 

In October last year I helped run DreadTober for the first time, which was a great experience. My son even painted an Ork Dreadnought with me for the challenge, then proceeded to rip me a new one with it on the tabletop! I can't wait to do DreadTober again this year! Hopefully, we can get a whole lot of people onboard again this year and make some amazing stompy bots. 

I also participated in Monster March this year and managed to paint a Forest Dragon which has been sitting in pieces at the bottom of my bitz box for way too long. It is in my daughters little Wood Elf army now, which pleases me no end. I advertised the challenge on MeWe, which has a very small but lovely Age of Sigmar community, and Gav Thorpe decided to join us in the challenge. Sharing WIP shots with one of my teenage White Dwarf idols was surreal. 

Sometime during the year the first wave of the BattleTech Clan Invasion KickStarter arrived at my front door. This is so exciting to me, I cannot even... Anyways, I managed to paint most of the Mechs I received in this initial delivery, including some for my good mates.

A little later in the year Sydney went into a harsh lockdown due to COVID19, which we are yet to come out of.  I challenged myself to finish a crusade army in this time. Quite a few of those models are on my to-do list as well, but I have not been quite as successful in getting them finished. Having said that, the preparation work is solid, so I am pretty sure I will get some wins on the board next season! There have been some significant exceptions to this though, which I will show at the end of the post. I even managed to get a few cracking games in before the lockdown curtain fell. I am really looking forward to some more gaming when it is safer to do so.

Overall, this season has really been a blast! Here are some finished projects:

2nd Edition Army Challenge

DreadTober

Monster March

BattleTech Clan Invasion KickStarter

9th Edition 40k

Tomorrow a new hobby season dawns! A new To-Do list will be forged! New badges of completion will be thrice blessed and sanctified! With it will be plenty of projects carried over from this season, as well as plenty of newcomers... if you can ever really call vintage Legion of the Damned figures "new"...

See you across the table,

Marc

Hobby Diary: Birthday Edition Part 1

 

Hi folks,

It has been a while since I blogged about my projects, mainly due to the enormous weight work has placed on my time and energy levels during the current lockdown. IT has been gruelling and there is no end in sight. At some point, in the middle of July before things got really crazy, I celebrated my 40th birthday. Celebrated is perhaps the wrong word, I did 9 hours worth of work Zoom meetings then crashed in front of Netflix with the Wifey. 

A few days later my kids brought in a mysterious package from my good mates, Howie and Wade. It included a bunch of Intercessors for my Dark Angels and a very cool selection of 3d printed Iron Snakes figures (well, Minotaurs Chapter but ripe for conversion!). Howie had painted a Chapter Champion for me, Apollon Drakaes, which was ready for basing already. I added the absolute minimum of bronze/verdigris to help him fit in and he was ready:

I also got some awesome Bladeguard with spears and a HUGE captain in Gravis armour, which I am working on right now. With some careful conversion I am hoping to use him as some kind of captain to go with my Centurions.

In other news, the 2nd Edition Army Challenge II is winding down as we edge towards the last deadline. I am currently using the last of my old school mojo to paint all of the remaining Dark Angels special characters. So far, I have rebased Sapphon, painted Ezekiel and converted Asmodai. Keep an eye out for some end of season army shots soon!!

Much more to come, as the end of the Hobby Season also looms, I dip my toes into Warhammer Underworlds, the count down to DreadTober begins AND Wave 2 of the BattleTech Clan Invasion KickStarter breaks.

See you across the table,

Marc

 

2nd Edition Army Challenge: Assault Squad TO-DONE!!!

 

Hi folks,

Back in the 90's when I was eagerly playing 40K but had no money for miniatures, I would often play against my mates using folded cardboard miniatures. They were roughly the correct size and had the wargear written on the back. They were sketchy, but we played some fantastic games using them! One of my regular opponents used to laugh at my assault squad (not too kindly, either), because they were all equipped with powerfists. His beef was that there was only one powerfist on each close combat sprue, so the most I could realistically field, at GREAT financial expense, would be two. Obviously, 3D printing was science fiction at this stage. 

Anyway, with this long held grudge in mind, I set about putting as many powerfists into this squad as I could using only 2nd Edition parts and a razorsaw. It was a painful reminder of how laborious conversions were in those days: hacksawing through an entire metal space marine to get to the powerfist takes some weetbix. I also clipped the hand off a monopose marine's flamer, replacing it with a boltgun grip, so that I can have a flamer in the squad as well. Jumping next to a weak infantry squad and flaming the heck out of them is a good laugh in 2nd Edition. Here are some close-ups of the finished marines.

See you across the table,

Marc

Hobby Diary Part 9: Azrael and Assault Marines

 

Hi folks,

During the week I have been busy constructing my assault marines for the 2nd Edition Army Challenge. The real challenge has been sourcing the powerfists I wanted to equip them with, because vintage close combat weapons don't exactly grow on trees. I know they can be 3D printed, but I had a couple of busted models with powerfists I knew I could hack up a little bit further. I also cut up a flamer from a spare monopose figure, taking off the right hand attachment and replacing it with the grip of a boltgun. Jumping in close and flaming things is fun in any edition, so I included a hand flamer in the squad as well. I also used a powerfist and chainsword from the classic CC sprue, then converted a 3rd edition chainsword to make it look more like the earlier version. To do this I shaved off most of the detail, such as the exhaust vent and skull pommel. They are now primed and ready for some airbrush work.

 

I have also been working on Azrael in preparation for a big final bonus month of the challenge. I am hoping to get the big three Dark Angels characters done by the end, including Azrael, Sapphon and Ezekiel. I have plans for Asmodai as well, which I may or may not pull off. I am using the official Asmodai figure for Sapphon, so Asmodai needs to be... something else. Azrael takes a long time to paint, as he is actually two figures and a fairly detailed backpack. The main body is well on its way, requiring some highlighting on the metallics and highlights on the black robes, combi-weapon and sword.

I also received my order from Greenstuff world, which included a textured roller for The Wifey's Necron bases. We are going to give it a go this weekend and see if we can base her first models! I'll post a little How-To tutorial when we figure out how to make it all work properly. 

See you across the table,

Marc