Scenery Project 1 - Sci-Fi Farmstead?

   I've fallen behind on a lot of things I planned to do this year with the idea of completing scenery projects just being one of many things on the list*. One thing I did want was to effectively make my desert scenery work for 3 different board styles; I wanted a more built up urban area, a more rural deserty area and a rural farmstead to be something in between.

*2025 has not gone to plan at all

   As we are still very much aiming for smaller games when we meet up, I thought it made sense to focus on getting that farmstead style building done. I decided to keep life simple and use the Renedra Mud Brick House and bolt on some sci-fi bits to prove my point - very much thinking of Tatooine as my muse. As I couldn't find the one I owned, I figured the best plan was to cut my losses, buy a new one and then have two of the same model I could substitute depending what I was playing.

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Red Butchers

   My World Eater project has stalled since the game at the Hutton Hearthguard, partly as I'd like to remove the daemon element I added to fill points and I can't decide what to do, and partly due to a plague of chickenpox affecting both boys while a bad cold took the adults out*.

*It was brutal

   While I am working out what my plan is, I decided to just paint the unit of Chaos Terminators that came in a recent Combat Patrol magazine up for this army, as it made more sense to give them a unit than my normal Chaos Marines**.

*I was hoping to buy more than one copy by I was told "a nice young man needed them for his online business"***

***so currently on eBay for 3x the price

  I've tried to make these guys match my regular berserkers and I suspect I should have broken up the red armour a touch more like I've done on my later World Eater models.

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Hammer and Rhino

   The last units needed for the game at the weekend were a Rhino transport (I probably need a few more in the future) and a Hellbrute. I'm a big fan of both models, I always like Rhino chassis and who doesn't like a dreadnought?

   I didn't buy the Rhino with an actual plan in mind of what it would carry, but  it was always likely to end up carrying the Eightbound unit and in game this is what it ended up doing, although, in the future it would be great to have one per Berserker unit. I tried to make it a bit more Khorne-y by putting a H Girder on the front to help balance as many skulls or useful helmets as I could find in my bits box*. I had meant to put more black panels on this to break the red up but remembered my plan by the time I was varnishing it**.

*next one I'll get the Battlefield Trophies next

**next time!

   The Hellbrute was bought one night sitting up with one of my children*** when I had this brilliant idea of what I wanted to do with one. I hadn't even thought beyond just having a Combat Patrol, so it was surprise the next morning when it dawned on me what I had done.

   I've added the chains pinned into it's arms to show that it is chained down when not in combat, a Khorne icon hanging from the waist from the Juggernaut sprues and added a trophy spike from the vehicle upgrade sprue as a good Khorne worshipper needs some skulls.

***I forget which at this point

   This post was meant to be posted on the day of the game, but I forgot, so I thought I would finish the post with a photo from the day instead, picking one that has both the units mentioned above in it. The Rhino didn't last long, so that was a tougher ask.

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Nuceria Calls

   The only thing I had to buy for the coming game was a single unit of World Eater Berserkers. There were a few ideas I had but, ultimately, I thought if I was buying anything with a deadline to paint, it should be some regular troops that might otherwise end up in my backlog and never get done. This was a brilliant plan, but a child coming down with Chickenpox really put a spanner into the works with the deadline looming.

   In the novel Angron, one of the characters that the novel follows is a traitor marine from a Blood Angel successor chapter (I forget which one) who has answered the call of Khorne and joined a World Eater warband, his whole motivation throughout the novel is that he is desperate to get the "nails" so he can really be one of them. When I bought my 3rd squad of berserkers I knew I wanted a small nod towards this, so I built one guy with a Blood Angel chain sword and Blood Angel'ly pad.

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Rebound By Eight?

   I've actually got a game lined up at a new club while I continue to wait for Wayland Games to open their new gaming space. The game is at a bigger points limit than I usually play at, but I'm not going to sniff at the chance to get some toys out.

   I have a couple of armies that I could break out that are either already at the 2000 point level or I could very easily get them to that level, however, I'm currently painting my World Eaters and I think it makes sense to use this as the kick up the bottom and get that army done.

   I've pulled every World Eater model I own into a list and worked out what the quickest way to 2000 points was without buying too much. This has turned out to be using the Khorne Daemons I already own to boost my numbers using the detachment that allows me to add them to my mortal army.

   This post is the first couple of units that I already owned that I've pushed up my to do list. A Lord on Juggernaught that was already a priority due to him being in my combat patrol, then the last 3 Eightbound that I bought to add to the unit I already have.

   The Juggernaught riding Lord, I tried to match his Juggernaught to the regular daemons barring the brass trim where I just like the new paint scheme so much more. If I had time to go back and tidy my daemons I would, but I don't today.

   The 3 Eightbound built and painted the same as the other 3 (full unit, next photo down), although I tried to swap backpacks and, I think, a weapon or two for some variety. I still really like these figures and there is a risk that if they do well next weekend, I might pick up the Eightbound character and a unit of the upgraded ones.

   I've got 3 units left to paint in the next week and have very little actual painting time, but I shall push as best I can!

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Land Raider Redeemer

   Over Christmas, when I was thinking a lot of Grey Knight vs Daemon thoughts I was toying with small lists and the one thing I kept adding to lists was a Land Raider. It was only when I finally caved and ordered myself one that I decided on the Redeemer variant with the extra flame throwing goodness, mostly as I've painted a few of the basic one in one form or another.

   Like the two units I've just posted about, this model was built, sprayed and had the base metals done fairly early but then sat on the side of my desk for months while I worked on other things.

   I suspect this model was the real reason the last batches of Grey Knights didn't move past the basic metals, I just wasn't sure what to do with it. I've used a few blocks of white and red in the normal Grey Knight heraldry patterns to break the shiny metal up but I still think this tank is missing something - possibly it's just too clean?

It was only when I came to photograph the model that I also noticed I hadn't stuck any purity seals on, which might have broken up the solid block of colour a bit more?

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Grey Knight Characters

   This post is about the two terminator HQ choices I have for my Grey Knights. The librarian came in the combat patrol and was painted up at the same time as the rest of the project, I just didn't post about him for some reason, while the brother captain/grand master (depending on what I need them to be) was Christmas present that sat half finished for too long on the side of my desk.

   The commander is a Kaldor Draigo figure that I had been toying with picking up to use as the base for a brother captain/grand master as there isn't really much of a choice in that department for the Grey Knights but I was beaten to the punch and gifted one instead. This figure had enough details and bits on them that I thought I could make them stand out, however, as it's finecast, most of those details are fairly soft and I spent a lot of time going back over bits where a little edge of a new detail appeared after a wash or drybrush in the area and I realised there was a bit I had missed*.

   I swapped the back banner and took the shield off to change the overall feel of the model and it was only while painting him that I noticed he now has two guns. . .

*I found a lot of little purity seals this way

   The librarian is a much more simple job as I think all I did was a shoulder pad swap and a shield. Its only in hindsight that I wish I'd done slightly more on him to make him really fit into the army, but as its a generic space marine model that's trying to fit into the Grey Knight look.

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