Digging through the project box..Hobby ADD: Tau Pathfinder

Today, another day..another random model painted!

This time, it was a Tau Pathfinder I didn't even know I had until couple days ago!  I was going through my Tau stuff and found this guy in the bits. The only thing wrong with him is that the tab had come off the bottom.

I remember at the time, being unable to know how to get around that problem..seems so odd now as simple pinning fixed it.   That was more then 4 years ago however.

Not only the modeling, but the painting. Nothing really wrong with the paint on my Tau despite being so long ago, but I do notice the paint isn't thinned well and the edge highlights aren't great..probably from trying to use a crappy brush.  This guy is miles ahead of where I was then.

Anyway not very exciting but to me a very interesting note on hobby progression.

Pic, then bed. 

Let the hobby ADD continue..Meganob, Vengeance Weapons Battery

After dry brushing metalics on my weapons batteries, I stared at them for a while unable to decide how to go further. So I started doing other stuff.

First, I finished my OFCC display board by gluing together and to the board the frame.  The $8 I spent on the miter box was totally worth it.

Then I started going through my project box, and instead of going to bed I pulled out a long-forgotten Meganob and started painting.   This was mostly driven by a weird desire to run Ghazzy and Farsight in the same list..

Tonight I finished the Meganob, that gives me 5 total.  I use Tin Bitz for the color, which is one of my favorite colors of all time. My current pot is nearly dead, but I have a brand new one hiding, waiting for the day it's needed. Tomorrow? I need to build a list lol.

Codex supplements - Best thing ever, or blatant money grab?

So I recently posted a video of my review of the Farsight Enclaves supplement.  First comment, was from someone who usually I greatly respect but in this case I think he's way off.

 

"All of this should have just been in the main codex..  this is little more than blatant cash grabbing."

Ugh. no.  First, and most importantly..these supplements (especially the Black Legion one coming next month) have been one of the things people have been asking for, repeatedly, for a long time.

Basically GW does what it's customers ask for, yet still gets belittled for doing it? Damned if you do, damned if you don't, eh?

So the response to this was:

"it should have all been in the codex, especially when released THIS close to the initial dex's release.. they obviously had all of this in mind when releasing Codex Tau. If you feel that charging the same amount for an additional book containing roughly 3 pages of actual RULES which still requires the main codex to play is NOT gouging, then congrats on being exactly the type of customer GW feeds on and why everything they sell costs so god damn much."

Oh bugger.  Really? No, it should not have been in the codex. First, this supplement and the Iyanden supplement have both been, what 50% or more as big as the codex.  So including all of this in the main codex would make it much more expensive. For content only a fraction of the customers will ever use. He seems to think people only care about rules.

However, nothing could be further from the truth.  Most people love the armies they play not because they beat face at Adepticon, but because they love the background, look, play style or some other aspect which can be unique to one army or faction within an army.  My Orks, for example, are slowly moving towards Blood Axes.  Not only are Blood Axes a fairly rare look among Ork players, but the fluff fully matches my play style.  And camo is fun as fuck to paint.  If there were ever a Blood Axe supplement, you would be damn sure I'd eat ramen for a week to get it.

The other important point, is that supplements are OPTIONAL. Completely, totally optional. No one is required to buy one to play, unlike say..models.  If you don't like Farsight or Iyanden, and most people who play those armies don't, then don't buy the supplements.

A lot of Space Marine players hate Ultramarines.  So, having a Space Marine codex that isn't Ultramarine centric isn't a bad thing. Then those people that do like them, can buy the supplement to fully conform to the Codex Asartes.

My opinion stands. Codex supplements are not only something people WANT, but want them for their army.  They can't put 50 plus pages for each of 2-3 factions in the codex (say Beil-Tan and Saim-Hann for eldar) .  If they tried, then you suddenly have a 250 page codex. Then he would be complaining about the price of the codex!

All I have to say is, keep it up GW. Giving people what they ask for can never be bad, and fuck the nay-sayers.

P.S.  Blood Axes, please?

Hobby ADD kicks in again - Cynar models based!

Last couple of days I've been wondering between projects.  Yesterday I worked on my next 5 Grey Hunters. I based and washed them, then pulled off the non-helmeted heads and painted those. Then started working on some dry brushing.

I got bored with that. However I did it mainly to try out my new GW dry brush. I have been using flat, cheap synthetic brushes for drybrushing but they die very, very quickly. My goal was to see if the GW one would last any length of time. I have more to do to find out for sure, but I can say the results are miles ahead of the cheap flat brush. I'm going to try a cheap round brush to see if it gives the same results.

Today I started by priming my Vengeance Weapon Batteries. I was going to start painting them, but have not decided fully on what exactly I'm going to do with them.  So I started organizing my hobby stuff..starting with my resin bases.

Which lead me, irrevocably, here.  I found the resin bases I bought for my Cynar that I had completely forgotten about. So I grabbed them, some plasticard and went ahead and based all my models. I really, really wish I had the money to finish buying my 35pts. Sigh.  Anyway I have a nice industrial decking theme from the resin bases I did buy, and just built my own for the rest.

So that's it for now.  I can't seem to concentrate on any one project long enough to finish it. 

Who says yellow is hard to paint? - Imperial Fist test model.

I might have a chance to pick up a commission, some Imperial Fists. I read about this method of painting yellow back when the new GW paints first came out, but I had to try it myself to see how it came out.

It is really, really easy to get this quality of yellow. 

White primer. Base color of Ushabti Bone, wash with Agrax Earthshade. Layer back the Ushabti bone, then a 50/50 mix of white and bone, and finally a final highlight of white.  After that, two coats of Lamenters Yellow glaze transforms the model to this color.

I might have to change the ratio on the first highlight.  It showed up really well when painting on, but lost a lot of the change when glazing.  It needs to be more dramatic to survive the glazing process.

I also need more dramatic highlights on the red, especially on the corners of the shoulderpads, but the point was to try the armor scheme..I know how to highlight red.

So that's it for this quick update.  Feedback always welcome!

First Grey Hunters complete!

Finished the 5 Grey Hunters I've been working on lately. I used a base of The Fang which gave me much more dramatic differences between the shadows and highlights I missed on the Rune Priest (which used a base of Space Wolves Grey).

I've decided to make each Grey Hunter's right shoulderpad different instead of trying to make each squad different. That way I don't have to worry about what models go where. The colors for the shoulders came strait from the Space Wolf codex.

The basing is the same as my Tau army as the Space Wolf detachment is mainly designed to be an ally for them. Unlike my Blood Angels I'm doing chipped paint and pigments to make these guys much more battle worn.

Being lead by a Rune Priest

I'm extremely happy with the way these guys are coming out, especially since they are really the first guys I've painted fully assembled, so I learned quite a bit.

Again, this was done mostly with drybrushing on the armor, gold and fur.  It's quick enough yet looks more then good enough for me.

Farsight Enclaves supplement - Error in Kindle version?

I broke down and spent real money on the Farsight ebook instead of waiting for the hardback copy in  October.

I bought the Kindle version for my Samsung Galaxy, as I'd rather play with Flashgitz then buy an Apple product.  I was looking through The Eight and found a strange entry that didn't match up with other leaks I'd seen.

Now what is odd is that the stats match up to a commander in Iridium armor..which is what the ibook version has (over at places like 3++ they have images).  Same points, but the Kindle (.mobi format) has him in a Riptide with XV8-02 stats.

Video up soon on my thoughts of the Enclave.  Hint: It makes Tau even more broken.