Legion of the Damned Combat Squad 2: TO-DONE!!!

 

Hi folks,

During the Easter long weekend I went down the south coast of NSW with my wife and kids. After a pretty horrible couple of months, I really needed to get away and reset. The place where we stayed is very dear to me and has a way of reminding me who I am. My family has been visiting here for over 50 years (before I was born!) so walking out to the beach is like travelling back in time. So many important things that have shaped me as a person have happened right here. Interestingly, it is also the place where I first played 40K, on an old camping table with folded cardboard figures. 

When I got home, with sand in my pockets and nothing on my mind, I realised I had very little time to get my project done for the 2nd Edition Army Challenge. I have really loved being a part of it, so the idea of falling short in the 5th month didn't appeal to me. I quickly put together some subassemblies an undercoated some things, then raced off at the start of the new school term to a Year 8 camp (supervising 60+ 14 year olds). By the time I returned I had less than 48 hours to finish the squad! Knowing this, I promptly procrastinated for another 24 hours and spent time with my son, playing board games and watching Fellowship of the Ring. During the last 24 hours I posted WIP shots as I burned my way through the painting stages, it was pretty epic and the other challengers gave me wonderful support. Here are some photos of the finished Legionnaires:

This month is bonus month and I have a large backlog of extra models I didn't get around to earlier. I'm hoping I can make a dent in those, or even get them all done. It would be really great to have the whole force complete before I move on to some more modern models and other things.

See you across the table,

Marc

Legion of the Damned Combat Squad TO-DONE!!!

 

Hi folks,

It has been another tough month on the "real life" front for me, but I still managed to scrape some hobby from the bottom of the jar and serve up this Legion of the Damned combat squad. The free-hand flames and bones were gloriously painful to paint with the deadline looming, but overall I have to say the artistic process was cathartic. The finished projects for the challenge this month should be posted soon, so if you would like to see some more retro goodness (the Eldar painters in particular are killing it), please take a look at the Dr The Vikings Cowabunga Slice and Dice blog. I have been writing a bit of fiction for each of my entries, so if you are interested on my own personal take on the nature of the Legion, you can catch up with the previous posts too. Here are a couple of close up shots of the finished models for this month. I am particularly happy with the squad leader, the base model for which was one of my first purchases in the hobby. They came in blisters of three back in those days! the rest came from a Warriors of the Imperium box my mate Heinz gave to me at some point.

I am a little concerned that I am running out of arms for my tactical marines at the moment, so I think next month I will have to do a scavenger hunt in my garage for spares. I am also ashamed to admit that I have nearly blown the deadline for Monster March. I'll see if I can salvage my project today.

See you across the table,

Marc

Legion of the Damned Dreadnought TO-DONE!!!

 

Hi folks,

It feels like it has been ages since I posted anything, primarily because it literally has been ages. So far, this year has been horrible. My son was pretty sick with COVID at the start of the school term, which also happens to be a rotten time to have time off, due to the workload all teachers have as we try to get everything going. A week after returning to work I became unwell myself, with some random thing, that put me in the hospital within a couple of days and made me profoundly unwell for 8 days. In total, I lost 8 kg of weight during this time, which is over 10% of my body weight. Within 2 hours of me returning to work, something else happened, which has taken weeks of active management to settle. The short of it is, real life has really put me in a dark hole the past couple of months. I'm slowly digging myself out, but it is going to take some time. During the last coupe of days of my illness, when I could stomach sitting up for a while, I managed to finish this Dreadnought for the 2nd Ed. Army challenge. I even wrote some fiction to go with it, which has been published on the challenge blog.

A fun challenge for the month was to paint something red (it is a 2nd Edition challenge, after all!). I chose to start working on some objective markers, starting with this Khorne helmet. Poor guy must have had some seeds in his pockets, because Khorneflowers have bloomed where he fell...

At the moment I am constructing a combat squad for the next challenge deadline, and feverishly painting a Tyranid monstrosity for Monster March... more about that later!

See you across the table,

Marc

2nd Edition Army Challenge: Legion of the Damned Bike Squad Complete!!!

 

Hi folks,

I have been a bit quiet lately as we have had a lot going on at home and work; it has not been a smooth start to the year by any measure.

For my January slice of the 2nd Edition pizza I had 6 bikes planned, including an old school Chaplain. After working for a few days on cleaning the models up, priming and free-handing the flames in Corax White, I realised the folly of that decision. I could either do 6 in a rush or 3 really well! As you can see from the photos, I chose the latter (if I am permitted to call my own models "really well" done).

I added a lot of fun little free-hand details, as I didn't want to pull them completely apart to add any Legion of the Damned specific bits. I don't have too much of that to go around anyway, so I am saving them for other units. I am really glad now that I chose purple and green as spot colours. They are a bit outside the box when it comes to Legion of the Damned, but I think they add a bit if interest to the scheme and contrast well with the flames. Additionally, where the scheme in White Dwarf did flat Boltgun Metal, I have added some components that are tinted with sepia.

For the first time ever (ever!), I had a go at painting the digital displays on the bike. I painted them like the motion trackers in Aliens as best as I could; it required me forsaking caffeine for a couple of hours.

The faces on Legion of the Damned models are always a challenge. I have seen them painted up as skulls, on done very pale, in White Dwarf magazine. For the sergeant I went for higher contrast, I very ghoulish look, based on Rakarth Flesh. I used Agrax Earthshade as the wash and highlighted with Rakarth/Ushabti Bone mixes. I painted the eyes bright green, to maintain commitment to the chosen spot colours (all of the eye lenses are purple).

Here's a big fat stamp for my efforts:

In February I will be repainting one of my oldest miniatures for the challenge, an old school Dreadnought. I have also just noticed that fellow bloggers and 40K friends on MeWe are starting to work on Squaduary projects, so I am going to spend some time this afternoon picking something to do as well!

See you across the table,

Marc