Beast Snagga Deff-Dread

 Focus Project ; No

    Another model from the Combat Patrol magazine that has been hit by Operation Get Stuff Painted. This time a Deff-Dread for my Orks. I have two* and I just decided that the first one would be the one I converted, with the theme being a Beast Snagga looking walker - hence the lizard skin draped over it's back, a skin on the leg (you can't see in this photo) and various extra skulls.

*they were so cheap

   I went with a green scheme, as green is best and it fitted the Beast Snagga theme a bit better in it. I have a few bits for my Ork army that are slowly getting done - mostly as I know the next edition boxset has loads in it and I don't want my backlog to be absolutely swimming in Orks.

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Speed Freaks

   In my head, I have half a plan of doing about 1000 points of both Beast Snaggas and regular Orks so that there can be an Ork element to out campaign* with me still being able to play any side that needs covering. The Beast Snagga combat Patrol is done and the regular Ork one is being worked on**, so when the combat patrol magazine added a BoomDakka SnazzWagon as the extra kit to their magazine for a tenner, I knew I needed one***.

*as one brother has decided to focus on them

**the kopters are worrying me

***I bought 2 . . .

   The more I have thought these two models over in my head, the more I like the idea of a mini Speed Freaks army - only 500 points or so, but it will be able to be added to either Ork army that I am building to boost numbers without it being against the canon.

   With that thought in mind, the first one built had to be in the traditional Speed Freaks colours - red with touches of yellow with weird little details all over it. This was one of those models that I built, did the metal undercoat and then had a block on what to do as it felt like a big job. Once I got started blocking out the red and greens, it was really good fun to paint and I'm looking forward to doing the next one - I just need to work out how to make it look different.

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Ork Boyz

   Another post slightly out of time as I was trying aiming to get some more painted and get a game in all about the time I started posting this project, but there it is anyway.

   While I was painting my Beast Snagga Orks, I very much had half a plan on doing a small regular Ork army as well. As per normal, starting with the combat patrol for a 'legal' army and working from there, but as it wasn't a priority and as I knew they were being covered by the combat patrol magazine, I kept the project on the back burner.

   Then July and August had the models in the magazine and I bought fairly conservatively, buying slightly more than I needed for the patrol itself but not clearing shelves as I would hope the magazines I left would be bought by kids new into the hobby*. The first unit I built and painted, as is my rule, was a unit of regular troops - the boyz. These were built completely as per the magazine with no funny business and then I got on with painting - all 10 in a single batch in a single sitting, which wasn't the plan going into it.

*Although I know one guy in my area was definitely clearing shelves to sell on ebay as he sometimes beats me to the shop

   I kept to a similar theory as my Beast Snaggas, keep the clothes fairly plain - in this case brown trousers and black tops (as the other Orks didn't have tops to worry about), but as I didn't have the blocks of skins to plan into my colours, I allowed myself far more freedom with brighter colours on the flat armour plates.

   For a first squad, I'm quite pleased with them. They can happily fight in the same army as my other Orks without looking identical. They are covered in dags, checks and flames, all the good stuff Orks love to paint, and because it's Orks, I don't need to do them perfectly, so I can just enjoy trying ideas.

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Squighogs!

   It's Orktober and I want some projects finished, so here's the last unit for my Beast Snagga Ork combat patrol - the Squighogs.

   I complained bitterly on the main Beast Snagga post about not breaking the 3 colour rule, so adding squigs into the mix has only amplified the problem - with green and now red filling 2/3s of that rule without even trying.

   I have also found in the past that red is a colour that you can wash, highlight and still end up with a blob of indistinct red, so looking online, someone recommended a purple base coat and no washes, so I tried that out and I am really quite pleased.

I'm also quite enjoying painting Ork check patterns

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Beast Snagga Orks

   Back in February, I'd been chatting to my brothers about the wargaming we planned to do this year and one of them gave in to temptation and bought themselves a combat patrol that none of us expected them to give in to. This sort of opened the flood gates of temptation and I found myself ordering two combat patrols in less than 24 hours. The second one I ordered was the World Eaters which have already been painted and have been on the table, but the first was the Beast Snagga Orks, which lingered mostly built, some painted but with no real momentum behind them.

   One of my brothers had the aim for 2025 that he wanted to get his Ork army on the table, so I wrote the option for them to appear in our current campaign (spoilers) and decided to also do a small force* so that I could reinforce him and keep the story going if he were to flag, but I did the new patrol of Beast Snaggas so that I wouldn't be stepping on his toes.

*it has since got out of hand

   This was a combat patrol that I started to build, sprayed the first squad, then felt intimidated by how to paint them and started other things instead. I tend to try to keep to the 3 colour rule when painting, so keeping non-black/white scale colours to 3 or less as more tends to get busy and just look wrong if you don't seriously plan them. I'm not good enough at getting warm and cold colours balanced, so sticking to the 3 colours tends to give me better results.

   These orks have green skin, 2 different animal skins on their backs, armour and trousers. If I went with "colours" I would go over that magic number without even looking at details and spot colours. The decision I went for was to copy my old Lizardmen skin colour of an off desert yellow for the scaly skins, go brown trousers to keep the brightness down and then rely on whites and blacks for the big blocks of other space, including the furry skins. Although, I did allow myself a bit of red for details as the various species of Squigs in the army will also be red.

   I then finished my first unit in March, started a post about it, then did nothing with the army for nearly 5 months as other projects took the priority. Now with Orktober coming up, I wanted to get the bulk of the army done while the drive was there.

   So below, we have the warboss and the two units of boyz, which just leaves the Squighogs from the combat patrol to go. Although there are 750/1000 point lists on the table that I would like to try if I don't get distracted too hard by other things.

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Ork Aircraft

   I've had the starter set of Ork aircraft since the Aeronautica Imperialis starter set was released well before Covid but I had never painted them. I had built the 3 fighters and started to paint them, but as they were the first models I was using to test out Contrast paints on, they just hadn't worked - like any new tool, you need to learn how to use it, and these were not a success - so they have floated around my desk ever since.

   We have a bit of an idea to put Orks into the new campaign and getting 5 aircraft ready for a game isn't a big ask, so I decided to repaint the 3 I'd tried. All 3 have been resprayed or completely rebased back over before new colours have gone on.

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