Sled!

Take a look at this sled! Winter theme go go go!

The Irony!

So, after all my bitching about Space Marines "sucking", check this out:

http://belloflostsouls.blogspot.com/2008/07/rumors-codex-space-marines-ics-and-more.html


FREAKING OMFG %#&)(%#()*!%&#*^!!!!!!!!!

Its a little long, so let me summarize what the hell GW is thinking of, which, in my knee-jerk analysis, might make Marines the freaking superhumans that can spit acid/survive in vacuum/digest toxins/etc that they are supposed to be!!!

• Estan (sallie special character) allows any and all Salamanders in the army to replace their Combat Tactics special rule with a Salamanders version; they get Master Crafted Thunder Hammers for free. All Melta/flamer weapons in the army, no matter their source, count as twin linked – also for free.
  The new space marine codex was so written that you can use any special characters in your count-as chapter. So, since I play "my own chapter", kekeke...expect alot of FIYAHHHH to be coming from me! Meltas and flamers count as twin-linked? OMFG BBQ!

• Storm Shields: now grant a 3+ Invulnerable Save versus shooting and assault.
  Heh, wtf. Terminators just got a lot better.

• Tactical squads: can have any number of marines from 5 to 10, but can only have special/heavy weapons if you take a full 10 man squad. They can be split into combat squads during deployment. To make up for the "must have 10 for special/heavies" rule flamers, missile launchers, multi-meltas and heavy bolters are now FREE! You only pay points to take the rest of the weapon options.
  
  HELL YES! Flexi squad sizes! I don't give a damn about the whole "special/heavy weapons requiring 10 men rule", I just like having my flexi squad sizes back!

• Dreadnought Options: Standard, Venerable, and Ironclad with each being an elite choice.
  
• Venerables are back to WS/BS 5.
• Ironclads have 13/13/10 armour and can take twin DCCW, Hurricane bolter, twin linked heavy flamer, and some others It also has a rule which (possibly a weapon option) called the Seismic Hammer which counts as a thunder hammer and allows difficult terrain tests to be re-roll as the Ironclad batters terrain out of the way.
• Dreads weapons options: Assault Cannon, Multi Melta, linked Heavy Bolters, linked Heavy Flamers, linked las cannon, linked autocannon, plasma cannon, DCCW, Missile Launcher, and maybe more. The linked autocannon can be purchased for BOTH arms, and possibly some others options as well.
  
  Dreads should, hopefully, be really dreaded from now on. Mainly we are talking about the Ironclad.

• Sternguard Veterans: have Deathwatch style ammo. Two can take special/heavies/special CCW including HEAVY FLAMERS. For +5pts each they can also take any combi weapon and still keep the specialist ammo type.
  Vanguard Veterans: are similar but are combat-heavy and can have jump packs as an option. They may be further upgraded to Honour Guard if you take a Company Master.
  
  TWO TYPES OF VETERANS?! ONE SUPER SHOOTY, ONE SUPER MELEE?! OMG!
  
  
• Power of the Machine Spirit now allows each weapon on a Land Raider to fire at a separate target.
  This rule now makes Land Raiders (the original "shitty version" with lascannons) *extremely* good. I've always held to my belief that the only thing stopping LR's from becoming utterly crazy is their inability to split fire, thus making two lascannons and a heavy bolter completely pointless. Now, with the ability to hit three targets with three weapons, LR's are now like Space Wolf Long Fangs on tracks. Insanity!
  
  
  
  And some rumors from B&C:
  
  
• Legion of the Damned are back! And, they have 2 attacks, can shoot rapid fire weapons (erm, their bolters that is) and still assault, and most importantly; THEY HAVE A 3+ INVULNERABLE SAVE!!
  Talk about a lot of 3+ invuls all of a sudden....
  and this really isn't a rumor, I saw a scan of the page from the codex.
  
  
• The Crimson Fists special character and possibly The Marneus Calgar are potentially going to hit with their Powerfists at initiative speed.
  This makes sense I guess, The Marneus has to be able to face The Abaddon and fight on even grounds....because only he is badass enough to use two powerfists; something that has been useless for the past two editions of WH40k =P

So yes, SPACE MARINES ALL THE WAY!
FOR THE EMPEROR!

Pointless Post =D

So I haven't touched my Dwarves in over a week, but its not like they are gonna rot without me painting them wahahaha

That said, I'm currently working on what I would call as the "Loyalist Abaddon Project". I'm basically gonna make an Abaddon "count-as" for my loyalist Space Marine chapter when I decide to play the Chaos codex. Look forward to it!


Note:
I like the Chaos codex 100x more than the current Space Marine codex, and quite possibly the next one as well unless they somehow really revamp the codex big time. Normal Space Marines have the melee combat capable of Imperial Guardsmen, just that they have 4S, 4S, 4I and a 3+ save, at the cost of being like over twice the price of a Guardsman.

What do I mean by this?
Well, quite simple, toss any specialist melee unit at them and they die. Horribly. Hell it doesn't even need to be an Elite; even some troops kill marines as if they were guardsmen.....

Chaos on the other hand gives me a few more options. Mainly I'm looking at Khorne/vanilla Chaos, since it gives me the "psycho melee badassery" that I really liked about the 3rd ed. Blood Angels codex, which also lost its fangs in 4th ed. I love Marines because of how they look, the fact I grew up with my Marines since I was a young kid also means a lot to me; with that said I believe I'll never abandon my Marines for as long as I play 40k, but as far as playstyle goes, I'm all for melee supremacy over "standing and shooting" - if I wanted to play a shooty army I would play IG or Tau (which I do play anyway, because I like their battlesuits =P)

To make matters worse, the upcoming codex will have the dumb "5 or 10 men" squad sizes; I happen to really like the numbers in between 5 and 10 (typically 7 or 8), and having to play in rounded numbers which I feel are either too big or too small just makes it all so...crappy.

I'll reserve my judgement for the new Space Marine codex till its out, but right now I'm admittedly fairly skeptical.

So, why Abaddon, of all people?
Because he is a psycho melee badass.
I'm sure my cousin would recall me talking (and he has probably even seen it on paper) about my chapter having an uber godlike monstrosity as my chapter master many many years ago. I believe I even mentioned to my cousin that I want my chapter master to *be* the Emperor, since I recall him saying that the Imperium would hunt me down for blasphemy if I claimed my Chapter Master was the Emperor. Ah, the joys of how a grade school kid's mind works........

So yes, anyway, I've always, and still do, envision my Chapter Master to be rediculously powerful. My constant exposure to anime involving people blowing up cities and shredding armies by just punching and kicking hasn't made my imaginations any less vivid despite my increased (but still kinda low) maturity =P

Abaddon has S8, I6, up to like 11 attacks (if I counted right the last time...4A + 6A from his weapons +1A from charging), ignores saves, rerolls failed to wounds, immune to instant death, blah blah blah; completely and utterly insane and yet completely and utterly fitting to my imagination of what my Chapter Master should be =D

That, and I happen to have a Chaos Terminator Lord kit sitting around. I don't really know what inspired me to buy it in the first place; heck it wasn't even on the shelves, I ORDERED it. I'm thinking its because of the bits (I'm a sucker for nice bits, like two very cool Lightning Claws and a big axe), but I'm not sure. Maybe my subconcious knew I'd make a loyalist Abaddon some day.... O_o

I'm fairly experienced at taking chaos miniatures and making them into loyalists....sometimes people ask me "why don't I just play Chaos". Really the answer is in three parts;
1) If my dad saw a bunch of Daemons sitting on my table I'm pretty sure he will be after my Blood for the Blood God =P
He hates that kind of things. He even thought my Terminators looked like demons. Because I painted their eyes red >_>

2) I like some of the Chaos miniatures, but they are all excessively spikey, which I really don't like. A bit of spikeyness is nice, but having toothpicks poking out all over the place isn't cool, IMO.

3) I'd rather play on the side of humanity rather than submit to some weird sentient super warp being. AkA I like being the good guy. Most of the time. I like my Dark Eldar because they are crazy pirates, not fanatical worshippers of dark gods.

So yeah, thats the end of my post.
Damn, all of that was kinda random....must be the time. 2.25am for the lose...
Till next time!

Completed Unit of Swordmasters

This unit of Swordmasters was finished awhile ago but I only got about taking pics of some of the nicer models from my collection. It’s got a mix between the older and newer models (in the front ranks). With the recent changes in the rules set, now they get 2Atacks and is amazing even if charged!

Podhammer

Just a shout-out to everyone, please tune in to http://podhammer.net/ and do drop a vote or two to support this superb podcast. Paced well with solid advise (Dave’s funny too), this is well worth a listen!

Spiders!

In response to Joash's comments:
1. I believe that the Black and Grey bears look good on the photos. I am not too sure how it looks like in RL but they work for me. It sure is cool the amount of bits you will get from a box of minis now. And since I am doing plastics again, it's so easy to transport! I can just dump them into a box or tupperware and they never lose the paint job.

2. Yes, it's a good price to pay for the minis considering how little money we pay to get so many! I've got about 40 bow armed Night Gobs that I won't be using that often. The spear armed ones I am good with. I guess I'll just have to hide my Fanatics within these units to make them usable.


Two pictures of my spider riders which I have been labouring away on these past week. These are part of my challenge to complete a unit a week. Obviously it'll be easier as I go along simply as I learn to streamline the process. I realise it's possible to do 2 cavalry at one go or 3 infantry at one go. 5 is just too many to do simultaneously as I get bored.

Teh Dorfz Are Lazy B*stards

Rather, I am. A lazy but busy person. I know my cousin will probably kill me if I kept on going quiet, but yea, I've been having quite a few things to take care of in real life as of late.

Anyway the picture is just a teaser of what I've been very slowly and lazily working on. Its hard to be inspired to paint sometimes when alot of things are going on in life =P

Anyway, the dude thats almost complete is Grombrindal aka the White Dwarf himself, whereas the dudes around him are what-will-be-his Hammerers. I'm still a little torn about how to do their beards though. If you look at the picture, the guy left of Grombrindal in the picture has a lighter beard; the guy to the right has a black-shaded beard, while the champion right at the end of the picture has a dark grey-shaded beard. I have no idea which looks better.....Black looks best on photos I have to admit, but it looks kinda weird in real life >.<

Not to mention black-shading is rather extreme.

As for my army plans....

Right now what I have would be a single Warrior box which will be my 16 hammerers, a Rune Priest and Grombrindal (aka Thane no.1, where the BfSP Thane will be Thane no.2). I'm already getting 2 BfSP boxes with my cousin, so that means I'd probably grab a battalion for an extra bunch of warriors to make into my longbeards (I'd probably want 20 men, which is bigger than the normal box of 16 models; the battalion on the other hand gives 24 men which is more than enough) and I really want that organ gun. Doing the math I'm gonna spend just a bit for the Thunderer/Quareller figures which I don't really need, but I figured some day I might just kick myself for not having a squad of Quarellers, so I might as well get them. Plus the extras will make good squad fillers to replace the Standard Bearer and Champion Thunderer in the BfSP Thunderer squad which I probably don't plan to use; basically just for WYSIWYG reasons.

Then I'd probably get an Anvil of Doom, because its so cool :P

Projected expenditure? One Anvil, on Battalion and whatever I owe my cousin for the BfSP; basically, the price of a single BfSP box. RM650 or so I guess - hefty, but when you've been playing miniatures for as long as the both of us, its almost like RM650 is "cheap" for a full 2000 point army, although we will all miss the days multipiece plastic regiments/squads were RM88 per box (40 sing) ten years ago :(

So thats all from me for now, happy gaming/painting/studying/working XD

High Elf Basing

Bloody fantastic!!!! Look at the basing this guy did for this one:
http://s90.photobucket.com/albums/k242/curseofbeers/High%20Elves%20May%2008/?start=all&special_track=album_paginate_top_view_all

WIP: Spearmen

Here's another shot of them in the next layer.

On top of that, I have found a nice picture of a Giant scheme I intend to use for the OAG. Especially like the tattoos on this giant.

WIP: Spearmen

Just another step in the process. Thought I would let you know about it.

Compared to the other spearmen, these boys have been receiving the 2 layers of paint instead of one. I just can't let them be done in the 1 layer solution. Unless they are really tiny, they will get at least 2 layers.

My WM minis have been getting 3 layers minimum so didn't think my first love should get anything less.

Painting Some Old Units

Started painting my existing Elven Spearmen I didn't complete previously. I want to slowly phase out the old Spearmen.

Here's a look!

Sunday Game - Back Into Warhammer Fantasy

Had the following game on 29^th June 2008:

1. Sam + Ray (Empire + High Elves)

2. Daniel + Tet Hong (Dwarf + Dark Elves)

It was our proverbial return to Fantasy. The whole group of us used to play at my place but have since gone off to do our own things but have decided to return! Daniel and I fielded 2K while Sam and Tet Hong did 1K each. With the dwarves, I find that Dan likes to play a very static army. With two big blocks of infantry hanging back, it was kind of boring. However, Tet Hong was constantly harassing our flanks and that made the game more interesting. I doubt I could ever do a Dwarf army.

Tet Hong was easily dealt with, having wiped him out early in the game. His trick of drawing a charge failed when he flee the Dark Riders into impassable terrain (he didn’t check and in the new ed, you lose the unit if they flee through impassable or enemy units).

Now the key challenge was facing a crossbow, organ gun and 2 Bolt Throwers in an open field devoid of terrain. Firstly, we had a very narrow corridor on our right flank, forcing us to field our infantry on the middle. The problem with multiplayer games is that you tend to just deploy without really thinking of the repercussions. Lesson learnt, I will want some control over deployment of the terrain. This is just so that the terrain is well scattered and not open fields of death like our game (very boring and unfair to my side). Ideally 6 terrain pieces, nothing more than 12” wide with each getting 1 terrain piece each. That will give both sides ample room for controlling the terrain and nerfing armies that depend entirely on open terrain to function.

With force composition, I found the 5 models wide shocking. Now my Silver Helms will have to work in a unit of 9 at least to get the additional rank bonus. I fielded 8…WTF! Also, Spearmen will have to come in a unit of 15 minimum or 20 if I wanted to benefit from having the rank bonus of +2. Striking first, this should help. Sword Masters with two attacks each are superb even receiving the charge. It’s almost similar to me charging! The problem with the rule is that it allows me to play quite defensively. I am going to write a defensive list to take advantage of this rule. More Lothern Sea Guard and RBT’s, Mages and rings!

Colour Theory 2

More from the same source:
Temperature

Color temperature is also important. Try to imagine if different colors were a different temperature on a thermometer:

Blue, Purple, Blue Green and Dark Green are all "Cool" colors that are usually described as "relaxed, calming, serene".. if you're a hippie. The "Warm" colors are Orange, Red, and bright Magenta which all "excite and aggravate" us.. again, if you were a hippie. Yellow and Green being in the middle are neutral to a point, and so is brown. These two could be used with about anything and it would fit in if it was in the right place. Now, the important thing to remember in Warm and Cool colors is that in shading, Cool colors look better, and in highlighting, Warm colors do better. Thus, if you were highlighting Green, you would use Yellow for a highlight. Some colors do not do well with Black and White, so this is the only way some of them will look good. See Tints & Shades Below..

Tints and Shades

No, they're not just car accessories, Tints and Shades are names for colors mixed with White and Black respectively. These are good for contrast, but some colors are just horrid when mixed with White or Black.. Look at this Color Wheel (and I apologize about the inner ring next to black, human mind is not as precise as it should be.. also note white circles would be there, if this was not a white surface):

As you can see, yellow gets this ugly olive color that would not be good if you were doing something yellow that is not camouflage. As stated above, you could use green for a shade or add purple to make a better shade. White also makes Red pink, which would not be used on fire. You would either use Orange or a brighter Magenta to highlight it.

Notice how the Warmer Colors stick out more in the Shades than the Cool colors? That's not a coincidence. It's strange, but the human eye see more of Green than any other color, but some colors like Yellow just appear too bright to us that we sometimes mistake a bright yellow for a dark or faded white..

Earth Tones

Now, Earth Tones are not exclusively for bases, as the name implies. Rather, any color you add grey or a dark color added to a brighter color, you get an Earth Tone. Now, these are the most natural looking colors there are and Vallejo carries them almost exclusively, and it's about all I ever use! Compare the bright color wheel on the left with the one that has had a brownish grey added to it:

Notice how the second one looks a lot duller a brown in comparison to the brighter colors on the left. These earth colors do not have to be flat brown, but some colors do look brownish, but they should be considered more of that color as an earth tone than brown... To explain, look below:

Notice that the first color is what I call a "true" brown, while the next color looks like a yellow, then next an orange, and the last a red. However, you note that they are not as bright as they should be. "Should be" being a relative term, because colors are that dingy in real life. Though it is good in the mini world to use bright colors, natural colors also have a good effect.

One good thing about earth tones is besides looking more natural, they also look better when put next to bright colors and metallics. Again, this helps with contrast and makes areas stand out more. Once again, Sturmhalo's Harbinger is a good example of this:

All of the major colors are dingy, making them earth tones, while the metallics shine because of their natural reflective qualities.

Cool Tips and Tricks

Now, some people can be misled by colors very easily. Look below and see what's wrong:

No, that statement is true. Not all of that sentence is Pink. It looks like Pink to you, although it looks a bit transparent. But then stop and think: the Pink on the White side is Pink, and the other letter are different. That's because they're PURPLE! And as we learned above, Red and Blue make Purple. The optical effect fakes you out into seeing that the letters are transparent. If the blue was not there, it would be a part purple, part pink sentence. This can be used all over that place. If blood was spattered across something painted, you could mix it in to make a transparent effect, even though it would be different colors.

Another tip about White and Black: When painting them, remember to save White for the Whitest of the White that every Whited and Black for the Shadows of the Black object in a room at night. Human eyes can see differences in color but our brain has been taught to call things when we were growing up. The best solution to this is to use an off White Grey or Beige for White things and use White as a final and absolute highlight. By the Same token, Black should only be used as a shadow on a black, matte object and the rest should be basecoated with a slight difference in a Dark Grey or even Blue. It should also be noted that all shadows are not Black. In the art world, things just have darker colors for shadows, much like using a cooler color.

Remember to keep the figure cohesive in colors. By that I mean if you use dark colors, keep it kinda like that. A giant patch of ultra bright Yellow or Orange on a dark Blue mini looks loud and garish looking. If you really want to use Yellow, use a darker kind of Yellow, like that mustard brown you get with Purple and Yellow.. This is just because you have to remember that the whole figure is in the same light, to unless there is a flashlight on just that part, the whole figure would have the same variation in colors.

Once again, these are the basic "rules" that you should have in the back of your head. You do not need to follow thing to the letter. I will not force you to put green in a red miniature, but you may think of what else you could use. Sometimes you may find it to your style to throw out the rules and do as you please, but it is better to learn the fundementals first. Have fun, and no more purple and neon green color schemes everybody!

Colour Theory

Building an army is hard. Most importantly, I want it to look good hence have been looking for any colour tips I can find.

This link is amazing: http://www.coolminiornot.com/go.php/go/articlephp/aid/194?

Color Theory

Okay, most people here are not highly trained in the art of painting and color, but it's been driven into me since day one in kindergarten and it's hard to forget. But even though color is a basic concept, it can be tricky and once mastered it will work for you.. or you can go and through the rules out the window, like some modern artists, But it helps o know what rules you want to break before you can break them, and so I give you my article on Color...(It can get a bit confusing at times, but I promise a comprehensive look and pretty pictures! )

How we see color:

Yeah, the above even looks like a Modern Art piece, but it's actually how we as humans see color. Now, the sun sends it's white, invisible light out in all the spectrums, but we can only see a part of it. That is, the white part which is actually all colors together, which make White in the light Spectrum (not the art spectrum, wait a bit for explanation....) Now, the light hits an object, an apple in this case. What is important to remember is that we DO NOT see just the red spectrum of light, but we see every other spectrum except that one! Every color except red is absorbed by the object, our eye sees this and sends a message to our brain. Our brain then interprets this as a red apple. The best example of this dependent effect of light on color is seen when a colored lamp is put on something. If we had a red lamp and turned it on in dark closet, everything would be red... that's because there's only red light to bounce off of it!

Now, in the world of art all colors do not make white. White must be used in it's pigment form, just like black. White and Black cannot be made by any other color, and even though white in it's purest form is light we cannot bottle light, just as we cannot bottle shadow for black. White and black still have interesting properties, though.. White reflects all color (because of light) and black takes in color (not light, that would be a black hole). If you set a black and white piece of paper out in the sun, the white one would be cool and the black one would be hot. That's because the black one's been sucking in energy and the white one's been reflecting it away. This is why White and Black are not really colors, they are called Mediums in the art world, because they have a different effect on colors used with them, as we shall see later in Tints & Shades...

Color Wheel

You probably made one of these in school and you may know this stuff already, but then again one of my best friends spent most of his life believing Dark Green was a primary.... The Primary colors, that is, those colors that cannot be made by any other color and must be made by natural pigments in the earth's crust are Yellow, Red, and Blue. These colors make up anything we need in the world of painting. In priniting and graphic design, the primary colors are Cyan, Magenta, and Yellow which look totally different, but we don't need them much in painting... The Secondary colors (those made by mixing half one primary with another half primary) are Orange, Purple, and Green. All of these can be seen on this colors wheel:

This is a very small and easy configuration, which I'll be using to show you other stuff, but the Secondary can be made into Tertiary colors, that is, mixing the Secondaries with primaries again, making 75% of one, 25% of another. This can be seen in the bigger wheel below:

The names of these depend on their placement, the one between Green and Yellow, for example, is Yellow-Green. Now, this can get a bit confusing with the two names, but just remember the primary name is never last, and it always lets you know that the color looks a bit more than that primary than it would be just half and half. The only exceptions on the color wheel with Tertiaries is that it is not called Red-Purple, it's known as Violet, and sometimes Blue-Green is called Turquoise... I don't know who made these rules, I just follow them to a point. Note that it's easier to get all the Secondary or even Tertiary colors rather than big bottles of the Primaries, because you would be mixing all day and not painting.. In fact, in mini painting, the more paints of varied colors you have, the less mixing you have to do!

Complementaries

It's strange how the human mind works.. we like things of opposite ends to come together to please us... The sweetness of chocolate and the tartness of strawberries, for example.. the same thing can be said about the color wheel. Colors right across from each other are called Complementaries because they look better near, or "Complement", each other! You can see these drawn together by a line below:

Now, this is important to remember in the mini world because it helps break away from monochromatic, or one colored, paint schemes. If you use Blue a lot, use Orange in some place. Now, some of these can be tricky, as with Red and Green make things look "Christmasy" if you're not too careful, but the areas do not have to be of equal size and close to one another. Heck, if you have a ranger in a long, green cloak, think about adding red to his rings, or even make him a red head! Below you can see a pic of how this can work to you advantage:

In Brom's "Loveless, most everything is red. The women's lips, her skin, her hair, the background stone, but one thing stands out the most: her green eyes. Of course this was by design of the artist's thoughts, even if he didn't do it consciously. This configuration makes her eyes glow and sparkle. Thus, complementary colors stand out if one is placed on top of or near another.

Another good trick with Complementary colors is they can add contrast. By mixing yellow with purple, you get a mustard brown color that is perfect for shading! The same can be done with all colors, and in fact I advise you to mix a complimentary in just a bit next time you're doing shading and see if it stands out more!

Colors can also be Complementary by Threes. That is, in a triangle you get three colors of the color wheel that look good together. The Primaries are Complementary by three, or a Triadic Complement, and so are the Secondary. The Tertiaries would be, too but they're harder to figure out just a bit.. A good way with any complement is to remember that all complements make Yellow, Blue and Red.. So two complements like Yellow and Purple would make all the colors (Yellow being a Primary, and Purple being a mix of Blue and Red). There are also complements in fours, but o a colors wheel of 6, you're taking most of the colors. It's best to remember this works for all major details like cloaks, shirts, pants, and boots and tiny little details factor in the color scheme, but not that much.

Analogous

Analogous colors are right next to each other on the color wheel if you "spun" it. Usually only three to four colors are analogous, on a 6 color wheel anything else would be like painting a rainbow. As show, yellow, orange and red are analogous:

Analogous colors when placed next to each other come together, but do not really excite the eye as much as Complementaries. When most people start out, their colors are analogous on most of their miniatures without even knowing it! This makes them seem a bit dull, and the best way to rectify it would be to use complementaries, as above.. However, if the analogous colors are varied enough, it can have good results:

Sturmhalo's Harbinger of justice is the best example of a muted, Analogous color scheme. Note the skin matches the cloak, which matches the boots, which matches the bow, which matches the hair to an extent.. about the only thing not brownish is the metal, but it's a given metal should be metal colored!

Now, do not get Analogous and Monochromatic confused. Analogous is colors really close together. Monochromatic is just one color for everything. like if you sprayed a mini all red and said it was done.