Varghulf almost completette

HEEEEEEEEEY YOOOOOOOOOU GUUUUUUYS!!!!

Don't know where that came from but yeah..... good film.

Anyway as you may be able to tell from the lack of post. I didn't get an opportunity to paint this weekend. My son just wouldn't settle long enough for me to paint on Saturday and I was at one of my friends kids parties on Sunday so the progress is only from today (and it's looking increasingly like I'm not going to be finished for Saturday. I'm enjoying painting during my breaks, not really enjoying painting to a deadline)

Anywa today I applied screaming skull as a highlight to the bone areas on the Varghulf, then white scar to the tips of the bones. I then painted the flesh areas (except the wing membranes) with pallid witch flesh with a touch of administratum grey I then did the wing membranes pallid witch flesh with a touch of gehenna's gold (trust me here). I then highlighted the most raised flesh areas with pallid witchflesh and edge highlighted the wing membranes pallid witch flesh also. I painted the areas that are going to have the exposed muscle effect ceramite white. Finally I applied washes. I'm still applying my 3:1 lahmia media (which I accidentally spilled a bunch of today, devastated) and agrax earthshade on the terrogheist wings as well as on the Varghulf's claws and then a 8:1 lahmia media to druchii violet over the flesh of the Varghulf (including the wing membranes)

So hopefully tomorrow I'll have the varghulf finished and be able to work on some of my crypt horrors.

So untill then.

Roleplay dwarf out!!

Today's progress. Varghulf courtier and terrorgheist

Good evening everyone, or whatever part of the day it it's where and when you're reading this.

I know yesterday (this morning but I started the post yesterday.) I kept saying with the terrorgheist that I was done for now but if I get time I'll do other stuff to it. Well I arrived at work early today so I applied the blood for the blood God to the areas I said I would

In between painting layers on the varghulf courtier I applied several coats of 3:1 lahmia medium to agrax earthshade to the wings working from the bottom of the wing to the top finishing a little further from the top each time, this is far from finished and still take many more layers.

So to the varghulf. The varghulf is based a similar way as the terrorgheist (resin decals stuck to the base, layer stirland mud with agrellan earth on selected parts) the whole model was then affiliated Corax white.

I base coated the skin and bone sections of the model with rakarth flesh and the fur with mornfang brown. I then shaded the flesh with a 3:1 lahmia media reikland flesh mix and shaded the fur with agrax earthshade. 

The fur was then dry brushed skrag brown. The sections mentioned so far were done before today as I was originally going to batch paint my warband but then I decided my abhorrent ghoul king on the terrorgheist deserved better than that. So the following short section is what I got fine today. keep in mind what I was doing to the terrorgheist today too)

I layered ushabti bone onto the bone sections of the model and then shaded them with agrax earthshade. I then went over the bone sections with ushabti bone again avoiding the recesses.......... and that's it........ No seriously I told you I was a slow painter

Hopefully I will be able to find more time this weekend to get more done. If I do you'll get my end of day update. If not I'll see you Monday.

Thanks for sticking with my slow ass

The Roleplay dwarf

Been too long, Back to painting

Hi everyone *looks at his number of followers.....1......* Yeah I'm still going with "Hi Everyone" for that opener.

So it's been over a year since my last post and since my 1 follower know me he knows why but to any future followers/ other people who may read this some explinations:

1) I'm lazy and had no ideas. (brutally honest)

2) I got a new job (Yay!!)

3) I got a baby! (found out about my wife being pregnant on the day I got offered the job so double yay!!!)

Anyway recently since I have no time to do painting at home I've been taking my models and paints to work with me and painting during my breaks. I have been sending almost daily pictures of my progress to a couple of my friends and have been enjoying doing it when suddenly I thought "Hey. there's a blog idea!!"

My local Warhammer store (it still feels odd not calling it Games Workshop) is having it's birthday on the 17th of September and is having competitions including an Age of Sigmar painting and a warband tournament (also a conversion competition but I'm still not confident with conversions).

Since I'd bought some Flesh Eater Courts models with the intention of starting Age of Sigmar this seemed like a good opportunity to generate a warband and get it built and painted to a deadline (a deadline that I think I'm going to miss to be honest but I've made a good go of it so far.)

My warband (I chose the abhorrent ghoul king on terrorgheist the rest were randomly rolled):

Abhorrent ghoul king on Terrorgheist

Varghulf courtier

Crypt infernal courtier

3 Crypt horrors

3 Crypt horrors

A fairly small warband I should have been able to get it done but I'm a fairly slow painter and it doesn't look like I am going to have it finished.

Some notes on the kind of theme I'm going for. I think the true horror of the flesh eater courts is that nearly everything in it (except the Terrorgheists and Zombie dragons) used to be human and has been twisted by the circumstances they have found themselves in, the horror to me is that these twisted creatures could be any of us if we were driven to these desperate situations and I hope the paint scheme I chose helps to covey that.

As the center piece model I knew the Abhorrent ghoul king on Terrorgheist would take the longest so I started there.

Unfortunately I don't have any pictures from the very early stages of my work. the model was built as per the instructions and I stuck some of the older Warhammer resin decals on the base put down some Stirland mud and once that had dried some agrellan earth on areas the base, then sprayed the model corax white.

I layered all the bone segments and the ghoul king with Rakarth flesh then I painted ushabti bone on all the bone segments. After looking at some pictures of vampire bats and using this chart for a side by side comparison  http://imgur.com/PqKmYyU I decided to start the wings, fleshy areas and the ghould kings loincloth with mournfang brown which i then shaded with agrax earthshade

Sorry that this one was blurry I was trying to hold the 

model take a picture and hold a wriggling baby all at 

the same time.... all considered it could have been worse.

Next I applied a agrax earthshade wash to the bone areas and went back over them with ushabti bone being careful to avoid the recesses next a highlight of screaming skull on the raised areas and then a touch of white scar to the tips of any bones. With the bones of the wings that extended past the skin I mixed a 3:1 mix of lahmia media and agrax earthsade and  applied that in many layers each time starting a little further up the wing and working towards the tip I did the same for the claws.

 while each layer of was was drying I applied a skrag brown edge highlight to the wings flesh and loincloth followed by a deathclaw brown to highlight to the tips of the wings, tips of the hairy bits on the side of the terrogheist and the bottom edge of the ghoul kings loincloth.

On top of the ghould kings rakarth flesh layer I applied a 2:1 mix of lahima media and reikland flesh shade. Once this had dried I added a touch of administratum grey to some pallid witch flesh and painted it ontothe ghoul king avoiding the recesses. I then allpied a final edge highlight of palid witch flesh to the t zone of the ghoul kins face and the more defined edges of his body.

Next I made a 8:1 mix of lahmia media to druchii violet and applied it to all of the flesh areas on the ghoul king focusing especially on the areas where the brighter colours met the recesses. the ghoul king has a few raised areas that look like spots, to them I dotted on some ungor flesh, then corroburg crimson (just a dot you want it to form a very small pool around the pustule) and then dotted ungor flesh on again.

Now I started working on the exposed muscles of the terrorgheist. Using a 3:1 mix of lahmia media and  carroburg crimson and applied it in many layers leaving the bits closet to bone whiter and applying more and more to the thicker areas of muscle, with the muscle around the ribs I left the parts that would be close to a rib with less shade than the recesses further from the ribs While each of these layers were drying I painted the underside of the tail, tongue and the organs inside the rib cage mephiston red and shaded it with carroburg crimson.

Since each of these washes took a while to dry. While they were drying I painted the rocks on the base abbadon black and highlighted them dawnstone (I'm not happy with the effect that gave if I have time before the competiton I'm going to go back in and cover most of the dawnstone areas with eshin grey leaving the dawnstone only on the most raised areas). I also painted and rimmed the base in mechanicus standard grey, washed the entire base in nuln oil (that was alot of wash) then dry brushed dawnstone over the base and then a further lighter drybrush of admistratum grey. 

 Back to the muscle, the muscle was looking a bit pink so to the thickest areas of muscle and deepest recesses of the muscle and the ribs too I added a 2:1 of lahmia media to druchii violet and did 2 or 3 layers of this. While those were drying I painted the scraps of cloth under the neck and the inside of the eye socket Macragge blue, washed them with drakenhoff nightshade (drawing a bit extra out into the socket to try and get a bit of object source lighting) and then highlighted with altdorf guard blue. I made a small mix of about 1;1 deathclaw brown to ushabti bone and highlighted the tip of the ghouls loincloth with it.

To the parts of the ghould king and muzzle and claws of the terrorgheist where I was going to be applying blood for the blood god to I made a 3:1:3 mix of carroburg crimson, agrax earthshade and lahmia media and applied it to the areas going a bit further than I intended to use the blood. I then added the blood for the blood god to the teeth, face, inside the mouth and down the tongue of the terrogheist as well as to it front claws (I then ran blood for the blood god down the rocks on which the front claws were placed and pooled it where it would) I also added it to the face of the ghoul king and to his hands (upto the wrist) and finally added it to the deepest recesses of the muscles and ribs and also around any recesses where flesh meets exposed muscle (if I have time before the competition I will be doing to same for where flesh meets exposed bone)

So for now I'm considering this model "done" I'm not 100% happy that it's complete and there's plenty I still want to do to it if I find the time (as well as the things mentioned above the wings look a little flat so I'd like to do a gradual shade on them and I'd also like to apply some blood for the blood god to the internal organs to give them a sheen) but I don't want to spend all my time n this one model and have nothing else from my warband completed before the competiton

So there we have it. My last 2 weeks progress. Tune in tonight to see what I achieve at work today.

Until next time

The Roleplay Dwarf

Finally back to painting

  After a long break from painting, with all the usual excuses of "the lighting's not good enough" "I'm too tired if I do it now I'll mess it up" I'm finally back to it. My wife once said that I wasn't allowed to buy more models until everything I currently have is painted. With me having more unpainted than painted this presented a problem. Thankfully she didn't stick with it so there was no real motivation other than wanting them to look good).

  One of the main problems I have is that I just have so much that I get disheartened when I look at the sheer volume of stuff I have to paint. I got my first army off a friend who was selling his army (Grey knights about 10/11 years ago) which I painted, and have since stripped because when I look at the paint job I did back then I feel nothing but shame so have only 5 completed models.

 I then made the mistake of for my second army buying a battle company, now buying the battle company in itself wasn't a mistake, it was with the release of 5th edition Apocalypse and the savings I made was fantastic, but 106 marines, 8 rhino's and a razorback. The sheer volume I had to paint was daunting and this was only my second army.



  At first I wanted to do the army as Imperial fists as they have always been my favourite loyalists and since the foundation paints had just come out I thought I'd give them a  go. After getting my first rhino to the colour I wanted I decided that id was to do that with a whole chapter of marines I'd probably end up topping myself so I resprayed them black. Next I went for a lich purple (xereus purple) with a Dark angels green (Caliban green) trim. But after years and years of complaints about how this colour scheme looked it was time for another re-paint. My decision this time was that I was going to go with an established chapter (so if someone complained about the colour scheme I could tell them that this was a cannon chapter) in a colour that wouldn't be too hard to paint (so I didn't have the Imperial fists all over again) but wasn't the colour of any armies that I was already painting (so that I wouldn't get bored). I decided on green and after looking through a whole bunch of space marine chapers and reading about their chapter tactics I decided on the Aurora chapter as I already had lots of space marine tanks. So here is what I have complete so far of them.

My first of my linebreaker squadron, the vindicator with it's command vehicle upgrade used on it.

And my command squad with it's razorback.

I tried OSL with the captain from his Iron halo I was proud of the effect at the time but now I think I could do better

I have nothing else that I'd considered painted. I am currently working on my Grey Knights and now I have managed to put off painting even more with this blog :-P

I'm having potentially a few battles with my grey knight against some friends this weekend (one of  whom claims to have made a pure filth ork list) So stay tuned to see how that turns our

Catch you Later

The roleplay dwarf

D&D 3.5 Evil Campaign

Been a while since I've posted on here and my wife is talking about starting a crafting blog and with her talking about it it's reminded me that I should probably do this more.

Completely forgot to update my armies progress (and my empire army actually got some wins in that time) but since I can't remember exactly how many wins and losses I've had so not including them. I promise I'll keep it updated from now on and with a battle report after every one.

Anyway tonight I'm off to play in an evil D&D 3.5 evil Faerûn campaign. We've been playing this campaign for about a year now and the party consists of:

Sylus: Human fighter/weapon master
Skareye: Goliath cleric/divine champion
Elninio: Goblin ranger

and then my characters............

Oh my gods. Not sure if I've mentioned it on here before but in roleplay I have a similar reputation as I do in wargames. I'm a bit of a red shirt and have a high turn over of characters.

When the campaign started I was a Tiefling wizard specialising in conjuration (dropped evocation and transmutation). I wanted to play a wizard who was a little different and by dropping those two schools it would force me to play it differently to what I was used to with wizards as I'd come to rely on those schools...... He was useless, in combat situations he was alright, in any situation you'd want a wizard out of combat (knock spells and other such utility spells) he was useless. he was also quite serious and severe, Elninio ordered him a male hooker to his room at about 3am and my character saw that as an act of war (he thought he goblin was trying to kill him by ensuring he wouldn't get the required rest needed to be able to prepare his spells. So i tried to poison him, but Elninio gave the coffee beans (he'd become obsessed with coffee after being introduced to it) in which I'd put the poison in to a city official. So I tried to be more direct and tried to sneak into his room to kill him but failed my sneak roll and he woke up and warned me not to try again. I left it for a while and then next time we were in combat I loosed a lot bolts at the people he was in combat with hoping the in combat miss chance would result in hitting him, that night he snuck into my room and killed me......

During my time as that character when we were robbing a temple of Waukeen I noticed that the party really needed a rogue, So I made a human rogue this guy was much better he failed to disable one trap but it was a particularly hard trap. The way this guy died started with a trip to Amn, on the way back we were on a halfling boat and spotted a ship in the distance not running any lights or colours. We' been warned "There aren't any pirates in these waters" *nudge nudge* Elninio not being a subtle being shouted at the top of his voice "OI ARE THOSE PIRATES!!!?" which meant the pirate ship knew we'd spotted them and recognized them for what they were, we decided to take the battle to them instead of waiting for them to raid us. The battle went well and we found a load of locked and trapped chests that we found the keys to so the traps auto deactivated. The trap was a black lotus imbued needle and my character was going down the assassin route so was a little obsessed with poison, so back in his room he tried to dismantle the box to release the trap for him, critical failure followed by two failed saves and he was dead.

During my time as that character I noticed that we needed some ranged support so I created a human ranger from the Shaar, I decided I wanted a character with some mobility so I could keep him out of combat so made him a mounted archer he and his horse were amazing for the 5 sessions he survived. he died last session raiding a caravan coming into the city when a wizard came out and lightning bolted him to death.

So I go tonight with a new character prepared another mounted warrior and a type of class I've always wanted to play (I decided I'd created too many characters for what the party needed and they all died so I created a character I always wanted to play) So I'm going with a cavalier. Lets see how long she survives.

Battle report tomorrow?

Ok so I'm playing 40k against one of my friends tomorrow. He wants to try out a proxy army again to see how it plays again (he played it before, just wants to give it another go to make sure it's right for him)

He likes bigger games (in fantasy he loves playing 6k) so we're having a 2000 point battle tomorrow (I have more than enough space marines for him to proxy his forces) His chaos against my Grey Knights.

I just had a couple of questions

1) Would you guys be interested in seeing the battle report?

2) should this count on my tally with it being a game for someone to get a feel for their potential army?

I apreciate all responses and if you want to see it I'll get back to you tomorrow.

Until then.

The Roleplay Dwarf.

Grey Knights vs Space wolves

Ok so today was the day of the battle so I headed down to Leeds battle bunker (a local gaming club) with my Grey knights

The List:

(Yes most of these models are unpainted/unfinished I hope during the lifetime of this blog you'll come on a journey with me as my armies get painted)
HQ

Grey knight Grand master              185

Nemesis force halberd                        2

Curiass of sacrifice                           15

Melta bombs                                       5

                                                        207

Elites

5 Paladins                                        275

Apothecary                                        20

The nemesis banner                           35

1 daemon hammer                             10

3 halberds                                            6

                                                         346

Dedicated transport (Elites)

Land raider crusader                          250

Multi-melta                                          10

extra armour                                        10

                                                          270

Troops

10 man strike squad                          210

2x incinerators                                    10

1 nemesis daemon hammer                10

1 nemesis warding stave                      5

                                                         235

10 man strike squad                          210

2x incinerators                                    10

1 nemesis daemon hammer                10

1 nemesis warding stave                      5

                                                         235

Heavy support

Nemesis dreadknight                       130

Personal Teleporter                           30

Heavy psycannon                              35

Nemesis greatsword                           10

                                                         205

Total: 1498

Bits I'm especially proud of/details I like on the ones I have painted/part painted

The crusader is covered in prayers taken from the infantryman's uplifting primer.

As well as the forge-world razorback multi melta turret (which I think looks awesome as well as being less flimsy than the multi melta attachment you get) I have the forge-world Land raider doors on my land raider

I'm also proud of the effect I've got on my (unfinished) Dreadknights greatsword. (I don't own an airbrush)

The Plan:

As I've said before I on't make tailored lists so this is my standard 1.5k list too and the reasons I take each thing.

So my list started how it always starts 2 strike squads with 2 incinerators in each. The theory being these deepstrike in from turn 1 onward and either claim an objective or burn someone off them. I give them both hammers so they can deal with heavy armour if need be and the warding staves as being the front line deepstrikers they're the most likely to come under psychic assault.

Secondly I took my Grand Master and gave him the curiass of sacrifice to give him the feel no pain and it will not die and a halberd as standard.

He then needed a unit to roll with. enter the paladins with an apothecary, a standard that makes them fearless and +1 attack, halberds for the most part for their +1 str and a hammer to deal with the meatiest monstrous creatures/ heavy vehicles.

A unit of Paladins with a grand master draws fire like no-ones business so I took a Land raider crusader as a dedicated transport to get them to the front line in relative safety. it's also the only unit in my army I consider "anti-air" (I don't own any stormravens) the theory being: You throw enough twin linked assault cannon fire into the air and eventually something'll stick.

Lastly I took the nemesis dreadknight, The area saturation of the heavy psycannon helps against hordes and the greatsword is the bane of low initiative monstrous creatures. The main reason I take this though is to draw fire. It's never going to be as killy as the grand master and his paladins but it draws fire so it keeps some of the fire off my land raider.

That left me with 37 points so I took the Personal teleporter for the dreadknight and melta bombs for my grand master.

The Battle:

Scenario: Malestrom of war: the spoils of war (only listing the objectives that secure objective unless they get secured)

Warlord trait: Lore master (after re-roll)


Grand masters psychic powers: Prescience, forboding, Misfortune, Scriers gaze.

Grey knights to go first:

These re the only pictures I took during the game. the lighting seemed too dim to get any decent results and I didn't want to slow the game

We used the Urban combat mega mat the following battle report is the closest approximation I can get to the terrain using battle chronicler but I'm going to have a play with it and see what I can do.


Deployment

 R, R2, R3 = Rhino's

                                                                                     D = Dreadknight 

                                                                                                     LRC= Land raider crusader

For some reason the objectives don't stay marked (like I said going to have a play) but those are the objectives. As you can see from the pictures above that go with this the rhino's were in deep cover and my dreadknight was just in cover.

Turn 1

I draw my tactical objective cards. The only objective to be captured is 3 so I roll for my reserves and one of my strike squads turn up (The grey knight special force org allows you to roll for reserves from turn 1) and deep strikes almost exctly where I want it on objective 3. My dreadknight makes it's 30" shunt to face off against the rhino facing it's side armour (despite what the picture shows)  my land raider moves 6 towards the center of the table to support my strike squads.

The dreadknight casts sanctuary and then opens up with it heavy psycannon wrecking the rhino and landing me first blood. With nothing else that can damage the rhino's in range in line of sight I end my turn bagging a victory point for holding point 3 and an additional victory point for achieving another tactical objective for wiping out an entire unit (the rhino)

The space wolves draw tactical objective cards getting secure objective 3 and 6 (and hold your ground, I choose a tactical objective and he has to hold it for two consecutive turns to score it, I choose 3)

The space wolves move their rhino's towards my strike squad and disembark with two units of grey hunters and the other unit of grey hunter move to surround my dreadknight (smartly avoiding the area saturation shell).

The only power the space wolves get off is Tempest's wrath on my strike squad

 After the shooting at my strike squad I'm left with two members and the other grey hunter squad shaves all but one of the wounds off my dreadknight (only the 4+ save from sanctuary saved him)

end of turn space wolves claim no objective.

VP's: Grey knights: 3 Space Wolves 0

Turn 2

I draw more cards and draw secure objective 1 (Unfortunately I forgot to do this until after I moved so wasn't in position to secure objective 1 and do anything else)

My second set of reserves turn up and don't scatter an land into a position harass the grey hunters. I move my land raider to secure objective 6 and deploy my Paladins with grand master.

The dreadknight casts sanctuary again the rest of my psychic phase fails.

I start by burning the hell out of some grey hunters he loses some to it, my storm bolters soften him up more. the grand master and the paladins also shoot this squad to no effect. My dreadknight makes 6 shots at the other grey hunter squad killing 4 then charges.

Overwatch does nothing, the grand master tries to charge the grey hunter squad they just shot at (need a 12" to be in but I decide to go ballsy) overwatch does nothing but it doesn't matter I'm not in. The dreadknight kills 3 grey hunters but is then fisted to death. the grey hunters consolidate.

I claim a tactical objective for his claim objective 3 and claim objective 6

The Space wolf stormwolf transport appears by outflank, he moves his rhino to claim objective one. his grey hunter squad moves to claim objective 3 and his other squad moves up to rapid fire my strike squad (I show it slightly wrong here) the last grey hunter squad starts to move towards the action

No psychic powers manifest.

His Stormwolf glances and penerates my land raider resulting in a Crew stunned which is downgraded to crew shaken (thank the emperor for extra armour). his grey hunter squad in the ruins finishes off the remainer of my strike squad and the other grey hunter  squad rapid fires my other strike squad leaving me with 6 models.

End of space wolf turn he claims my claim objective 1

VP's: Grey Knights: 5 Space Wolves 1

Turn 3

(I got what's going on with grey hunter squad wrong here but it'll be right after this turn. stick with me :-P, still learning the tech)

I draw secure objective 6

I turn the land raider on the spot to face the stormwolf transport and hold objective 6, my paladins move up to assault the rhino as I suspect they won't be in range to assault and of the grey hunter squads and I have an objective to destroy a unit in close combat.

The paladins cast hammerhand

the Land raider stars it's snap shots at the Stormwolf transport he declares a jink. I start with the multimelta and to my absolute amazement get a 6, reality swiftly re-asserts itself as I roll a 1 for armour penetration. to my further shock I then roll 3 6's with my assault cannons (no extra scored with the re-roll and get 2 penetrating hits, his jink reduces this to 1 penetrating hit and results in crew shaken.

My strike squad shoots his grey hunters, killing one and then charge.

 I kill two of his grey hunters in combat and he kills 4 of my grey knights in return. I make my break test and fail it but roll a 1 on my initiative, And they shall know no fear stops me from being wiped out and holds me in combat with two models remaining.  I charge his rhino and my grand master rips it to pieces before anyone else gets a chance to do anything scoring me an extra victory point

End of turn I score victory point for holding objective 6

The space wolf player draws capture objective 5

The space wolf player starts by moving his stormwolf transport to the side of my landraider and deploys his bloodclaws and general behind my paladins. The grey hunter squad 1 moves towards objective 5 (shown on next turn forgot to put it in here) and grey hunter squad 3 begins it's econd trn holding objective 3.

 No successful psychic powers

the stormwolf transport blows up my land raider taking a bloodclaw with it and using power of the machine spirit kills a paladin with it's helfrost cannon. The grand master takes a wound to grey hunter shooting.

The blood claws charge, overwatch does nothing. my grand master kills 3 before they strike and my paladins kill 2 more (who get to strike back) he kills two paladins in return with frost axes and my thunder hammer kills one more. he passes his break test and we pile in. His grey hunters kill the last two from my strike squad who take one down with them.

end of turn, Hold the line achieved

VP's Grey knights: 7 Space wolves: 2

Turn 4

No movement phase,

Psychic phase I manage to get hammer hand off but am denied force.

No shooting phase

He challenges my grand master. Not wanting him to be left out of the combat I accept but due to the Armour of Russ. My Paladins kill 2  but the return strikes kills off the remainder of my paladins and bleeds a wound over onto my grand master. He attacks in his challenge dealing 1 unsaved wound but is them promptly finished off.

I have no forces remaining the space wolves therefor get a crushing defeat and his undefeated record stands.


Thoroughly enjoyable game though and Has given me some thoughts as to what I might change.

Until then

Roleplay dwarf