Two Deathwatch Veterans

Due to other things taking more of my time recently, I will, for the foreseeable future, make smaller updates. I will keep updating weekly, but instead of making three models at a time, I plan to post about one or two models at a time, with two models for Troops and other more basic models, and one for independent characters. Elites and such will be decided on a case-by-case basis.

I have been wanting to get back to Deathwatch Veterans for a while, and decided now would be the time. Call it a Christmas special.

 I knew I'd want an Iron Hands veteran in the Kill Team, and decided he'd fit the fluff best armed with a heavy weapon. The model is assembled from a mixture of the Kill Team and Devastator Squad kits, with a few Mechanicus bits thrown in there to finish the look. The Devastator Squad's more high-tech greaves in particular fit the Chapter's image well, in my opinion. I also gave him a helmet wih a lot of extra targeting apparati.

This squad was going to be armed mostly with shotguns and frag cannons, and while some of the Chapters in it were fairly obvious (there will definitely be a Minotaur with one of the weapons mentioned), some were less so. I almost made this one an Ultramarine, but decided against it, ending up making him a Crimson Fist. Being known for tactical flexibility and showing orks who is who, I feel like Crimson Fists are like Ultramarines, but without the stink of Mary Suedom on them. Sooner or later, I will have to get over my distaste for the Chapter, but that day is not today. I also consider it fairly certain that any of my Captains or probably even Sergeants won't be Ultramarines.

Three Grey Hunters, painted

I have a new pet theory for why Space Wolves' colour scheme changed. I previously thought it had become blueish gray gradually over time, until I read Leman Russ, the Great Wolf novella, where a new aspirant returns to the Fang, which had until very recently housed a Legion, but now was the fortress-monastery of a Chapter. The aspirant sees people in power armour of a mix of colours, some of them bluish, others gunmetal grey. My current head canon is that as the Wolf Brothers split from the Vlka Fenryka legion, they were given the Legion's colour scheme, and the Space Wolves changed theirs to another shade of grey. It has previously been established that the new Chapter was given fully half of all the men, fleet, and war machinery, and that the new branch was generally treated in a very egalitarian manner, compared to the Chapters split from many other legions, that treat their primogenitor chapter very deferentially. This can also be seen in the second founding Chapter's name, Wolf Brothers.

I don't know if this has already been confirmed or denied somewhere, just thought of this while painting these new three dudes.

 The Mk.VI armoured model was the first to be finished in this batch. I wanted to keep it simple, without many freehand shenanigans. I also decided not to paint the bolter casings red on this model, and maybe not in the whole pack. I wanted there to be some variety in my army in this regard, plus I just didn't want to paint them in such a bright colour.

 I again chose one of the pack markings from the Codex. This pack is named Soergar's Swordkin, which is appropriate, considering they will all have close combat weapons.

 The marine with spectacle protection ended up being one of my favourites. I wasn't sure how to paint the helmet, until I came up the idea of having it mostly metal colour. The slightly raised crest part was given a sawtooth pattern in red and the Chapter's grey.

The final one still isn't finished, due to my recently more busy schedule. There isn't much done, though, and I expect to finish him by the same time as my two latest Deathwatch models are painted.

Three Grey Hunters

Building a 40k army involves modelling and painting a few special characters with exotic wargear, a few elite choices and sometimes a few tanks, but most of all, it involves a lot of troops. To keep things interesting, I try to keep in mind that every Space Wolf is supposed to be a hero of his own right, and by the time they're Grey Hunters, they have a human lifetime of combat experience.

 I still have relatively few figures with long hair and long beard, even though it should be more or less the standard look for Space Wolves. I wanted to do something about that, so I gave the bareheaded Hunter both of the aforementioned. The model also has some grenades and a Phobos pattern bolt pistol on him.

 I ended up assembling a Mk.VI armour almost by accident, but decided to put a chapter-specific spin on it. I gave the helmet a reinforced nose guard (not that I think a power armour helmet really needed it, but it suits the look), put a wolf cloak on him and chose a pair of legs based on the Mk.VI armour from the Vanguard veteran kit.

The third of the models had a mixed armour, with Mk.V legs and Mk.VII helmet and torso. I wanted to have a model with bolter running forward, so I gave him a pair of hands from the Space Wolves Pack kit and an Umbra-Ferrox bolter. I also sculpted some reinforced "spectacle" form of extra protection around the eyes.

I intend to grow the pack to full 10 men, with no special weapons or pack-specific Wolf Guard leader. The plan is to give the pack a Rhino, drive to the opponent's deployment zone and just be a general nuisance.
I should have them painted by Sunday, assuming I still remember how Space Wolves in the newer colour scheme are painted.

Two Human Linemen and a Blitzer, painted

Getting a copy of Blood Bowl was fairly inevitable for me as soon as I found out it was going to be published again. I had only played it on PC previously, and from what I understand, everything that was good about the adaptation was in the source material.
I think my main team will either be Dwarfs, Norse or Chaos, and I may even end up selling one or both of the teams included in the box sets. I still plan to paint them both, though.

 I'm not very well versed in Blood Bowl role, and don't really know the colour schemes of many established teams. Coupled with the fact that I wasn't planning on keeping on playing the standard human team, I decided to just use the Reikland Reavers colour scheme. The biggest change I made was making my Reavers' armour plates look more metallic. I painted the metal parts with Leadbelcher. Then, I painted thinned Atldorf Guard Blue over Leadbelcher, shaded with Nuln Oil and then painted likewise thinned Calgar Blue over that. I finally highlighted the edges of the plates with Runefang Steel.

 I briefly considered buying the new snowy Blood Bowl board and keeping on using the same ice base I always make, but ended up using Lustrian Undergrowth, and drybrushed it in places with Warboss Green, Balor Brown and Gorthor Brown. I chose to leave the edges of the bases black.

The Linemen and Blitzers are relatively easy to paint with their closed helmets. The future challenges of Throwers and Catchers may prove to be more of a challenge, not to mention the Orks.

Leman Russ, Primarch of VI Legion

Last week, I mentioned that my Space Wolves could use some reinforcements with the upcoming Wrath of Magnus book (which I'm not sure if I have any non-lore reason to get, since it apparently only includes rules for Chaos Space Marines). Well, it's hard to imagine better reinforcements for Astartes than their gene-sire. Of course, the Horus Heresy Leman Russ model is set in the time he walked among his sons, but never mind that now. I suspect he'll be making a comeback to 40k fairly soon, possibly in a werewolf form, just so that he can repeat his match with Magnus.

 I usually do a fair bit of customizing my models, but aside the typically overdesigned sword with all the unnecessary spikes, and the slightly awkward-looking pose, I'm fairly happy with the model as-is.
I also kept the paintwork fairly unadventurous, with Mechanicum Standard Grey, shaded with Nuln Oil, highlighted with Dawnstone and highlighted again with Administratum Grey for base. I did want to depart from Forgeworld's display model, as I don't really see why Leman Russ would have green armour. Maybe that will be explained in their next Horus Heresy book, but I decided to base the model's paintwork on a piece of artwork published earlier this autumn.

 I wanted to have his wolf pelt white, to provide contrast for his dark armour. I also wanted to paint most of the gemstones on the model red, for the same reason.

The model, like apparently all of Horus Heresy Character Series models, came with a 40 mm base for gameplay purposes, that can be enclosed within a larger display base. The bases fit together relatively seamlessly.

 The scenic base has a slightly raised slot that the 40 mm base fits onto. The rubble, which I decided to paint mostly grey stone and slightly off white marble, makes the seam difficult to notice if one doesn't know where to look.

 Having added some blood to the neck of the decapitated head of the Thousand Sons legionary, I decided to add some to the scenic base as well, to keep the seamless look.
I can't help thinking the pose would work better if Russ' rear foot was on the ground as well, or at least slightly more bent at the knee and less at the hip. As it is, it looks a little like his rear leg slipped on the marble surface he was running on.

Two Wulfen, painted

With the upcoming Thousand Sons releases, it looks like it's high time I returned to my Space Wolves. They're going to need reinforcements soon. Luckily, I had already started last week (actually much earlier, but I had these two finished last Sunday). Should probably also get to work on a pack of Long Fangs, but all in good time.

 I had originally planned to make the pack look like they had just been changed by the curse, while still wearing most of their original equipment, but the Wulfen models don't really allow for that, as they are wearing pelts etc. over their black carapace, as well as pieces of armour specifically made for their changed physique. I then decided to use one of the Blood Claws pack markings shown in the Codex to be a part of Ragnar Blackmane's army in the battle for Alaric Prime, but switched the yellow in their marking for white, to fit the Wulfen scheme.

 I don't want my packs to look too homogenous, as their members are recruited from all over Fenris, so I decided to paint the chainsword wielding Wulfen with a slightly darker skintone than the other one. I used Reikland Fleshshade for shading this model, but I have to say I prefer Seraphim Sepia for most lighter fleshtones.

 The Wulfen with the improvised weapon was given a lighter fleshtone of Kislev Flesh, shaded with Seraphim Sepia and highlighted with Kislev Flesh again and finally with Flayed One Flesh. I also painted the Great Company badge on his knee, as his left shoulder pad couldn't really display it with all the studs. The Blood For The Blood God was added to the improvised maul after the model had been varnished.

The smaller backpacks seem to fit the Wulfen just fine, and I may choose to use some to model one more pack from the previously lost 13th Great Company in the future. I expect I'll put that off at least until the next Horus Heresy book from Forgeworld is published, though.
This pack still needs three more models, however. I'll continue working on it once I've finished sculpting a few more Wulfen heads.

Two Wulfen

When the Wulfen returned in the first War Zone Fenris, they were described being the lost battle-brothers of the 13th Great Company in the aftermath of the burning of Prospero. However, it was also made clear that the contemporary members of the Space Wolves chapter started to fall to the curse on their return, and I wanted to explore this aspect of the curse. Blood Claws are the warriors most suspectible to the curse, so I decided to convert a pack of Wulfen who until recently were just a pack of Blood Claws under Ragnar Blackmane's command.

 Unlike the 13th Great Company, who had 10 000 years to craft their weaponry, and were granted access to the Chapter's armoury, I decided that a group of whelps who have surrendered to the curse would not be given much in the way of hallowed relics of the Chapter. I imagine them having been outfitted with just some armour better suited for their altered physique and not much else.
I took one of the model's hands off a Thunder Hammer and used it to fit a chainsword in his hand. I also used a standard power armour backpack with the model. I also attached two normal shoulder pads to display the model's pack and Great Company markings. The most work intensive part of the model was to sculpt him a whole new head. I also decided to sculpt a tall mohawk, using similar structure to the one included in the Space Wolves Pack sprue.

Having sculpted one head with a closed mouth, I wanted another one with slightly parted jaws. The backpack came from the Mk.VI armour, as did the shoulder pads. I decided the model should have an improvised club, and glued some pieces of resin sprue to the base, with some iron wire through them to represent rebar.

I aim to get these jolly fellows painted by next Sunday.

Ahzek Ahriman and one of his little friends

Though I'm generally partial to the Space Wolves chapter/legion, and though in the larger scale they clearly are the good guys and the loyalists as opposed to the Thousand Sons, there really is little question that in the case of burning of Prospero, the VI legion were the bad guys and the barely literate invaders, who attacked the homeworld of the Legion focused on learning and answering questions, killed the world's defenders and committed a genocide. Of course, they were misled, and it wasn't long after that Leman Russ swore off following orders unquestioningly, but that wasn't much comfort to the now crippled legion of Thousand Sons, who only were attacked in the first place because their Primarch had tried to warn the Emperor of the archtraitor.

I recently bought a copy of the Burning of Prospero as a birthday present for myself. I really wanted to use the Forgeworld's colour scheme for my Thousand Sons, as they are not supposed to look like Blood Angels, but I neither have an airbrush nor their Angron Red, so I had to make do with Citadel colours and Lahmian Medium. For that reason, I wanted to try out the colour scheme on an expendable miniature before moving on to Ahriman. There's a fairly decent chance I'll end up buying another Burning of Prospero in the future, so if I decide to try this again with a different execution of the colour scheme, it will be an option.

 The Forgeworld's colour scheme is done by airbrushing the transparent Angron Red over a metal basecoat. I tried to replicate it by painting Mephiston Red thinned down with Lahmian medium over Leadbelcher base. I then proceeded to shade the model with Nuln Oil and to add some similarly thinned down Evil Sunz Scarlet to some of the most raised areas. I then highlighted the edges of the model's plate with Runefang Steel. The end result is more weathered than main GW's overtly clean look, and I like this that way. Confident I could get reasonably pleasing results, I proceeded to get to work with Ahriman.

 As usual, I painted the model in smaller pieces. I first painted most of the base, knowing it would be trickier to paint the slain Space Wolf with the main model standing over it. I also didn't attach the backpack until the very end, once the model was nearly completely painted. The Blood for the Blood God around the Space Wolf's corpse was only added after varnishing.
I also painted some eldritch glow on the model's extended arm's palm. I did that by drybrushing from lighter to darker colours, sort of the opposite it's done when highlighting.

Unlike on the one painted by the 'Eavy Metal team, I painted my Ahriman's cloak and loincloth purple, as he has on the box set. Bone or papyrus coloured fabric might have suited the Space Egyptian look better, but I think the purple somewhat foreshadows Ahriman's future, as if transitioning from red armour to blue.

I will have plenty of models to assemble and paint in the box in the future. I suspect this individual Thousand Sons legionnary will be an exception, and most of them won't be assembled with standard parts. At least not with the Space Wolves, who would not really look the part without at least some pelts and tooth amulets. Similarly, I can give the Thousand Sons some scarabs and other thematic decorations, though I will have to do some research to know what is appropriate for which models.

Three Deathwatch Vanguard Veterans, painted

There are probably several times over more canonical Space Marine chapters that specialise in melee than ones that focus on shooting. This would probably not be very realistic, but it means there is a wide spectrum of different melee-focused marines, from the Black Templar crusaders, swearing oaths full of zeal, to the silent and terrifying Carcharodons Astra, who kill their enemies with naked efficiency. This emables a Deathwatch Vanguard squad to have a nice spread of different marines, whose different styles would complement each other well.

 The Carcharodons Astra veteran's armour's molecular bonding studs give the model a lot of character, as does the fierce pose of th model. I wanted to leave the armour relatively simple and unadorned, as the chapter is known for their simplistic brutality, rather than their artistry.

 The Black Templar somewhat represents the opposite end of the same spectrum. The Marine would have sworn a number of oaths, both at the beginning of his duty in the Deathwatch as well as before each battle, and these should be represented on his armour. I ended up sculpting an extra litany scroll to be worn as a loincloth, just to make extra room for his oaths. I also scribbled some on the front of his right greave.

The Flesh Tearer would probably be the most terrifying of the three, to his opponents as well as his allies, since one can never be certain if one of his Chapter is going to be able to keep his aggression directed towards the enemy, instead of his allies. This is somewhat reflected on the model, in that I can never be sure if the model's heavy thunder hammer is going to stay on or come off, because there is a slight gap between the arms and the torso. To fill in that gap with green stuff, I would have had to first attach the weapon and then prime and paint the model, and I find that fiddly, so I just decided to glue it where it stuck and hope for the best. If it comes off again, I suppose I'll use green stuff.

Three Deathwatch Vanguard Veterans

While shooting is nice, and often the most effective strategy, much of the appeal in Warhammer 40,000 is in melee. Another important aspect are the Space Marines. When you combine the Space Marines all-star force, Deathwatch, and melee specialisation, you may have gone overboard, but I'm going to risk it.

 Black Templar is one of the Chapters I wanted to have represented in my Vanguard Veterans. I made the model to be prepared for a variety of different situations, so I gave him two power weapons, one being an axe, to tackle any 2+ armoured opponents, and one a sword, to strike at I4. In the lore, Black Templars commonly chain their weapons to their vambraces. I decided the model wouldn't really look like a member of the Chapter if I didn't reflect that.

 The Heavy Thunder Hammer is a very aggressive weapon, and I chose the Flesh Tearer to bear it. I gave the model one of the metal Deathwatch heads from the older upgrade kit. I also wanted to have at least one descendant chapter of the Blood Angels represented in the first batch of my Vanguard Veterans, even though I fully intend to have an actual Blood Angel there as well.

One of the chapters not represented in the Deathwatch Veteran kit is the Carcharodons Astra. I like them, though, and the chapter's preference for close assault makes them a natural choice for the Vanguard Veterans. They are often portrayed wearing the Mk.V armour, and I had some extra pieces left over from my previous Skyclaw project.
Lightning claws felt like a natural choice, considering the chapter's brutal style of combat.

I expect the models will be painted for next week's update.

Eldar Harlquin Shadowseer

The Harlequins embody the main problem I have with some of the later Games Workshop models, in that while the models themselves look great, there often really is only one pose they're meant to be assembled in, so if you have anything other than the one kit, you're going to be repeating poses very soon. This becomes a problem especially with the Harlequins that tend to have rather recognisable poses, as they should, considering their lore.
Fortunately, the Harlequins don't have many armour plates with straight, mechanical lines on them, so remaking parts of their limbs with green stuff isn't that difficult.

 Having recently read Andy Chambers' Masque of the Vyle, I decided I wanted my Shadowseer to be female. Since 40k miniatures aren't known for being terribly subtle, that pretty much meant just sculpting breasts on the miniature's torso. Considering how much the model is pushing its chest out, it's fortunate the model's hat somewhat covers the chest area, otherwise the end result could have looked crass.

 I also reposed the model's feet so that it's no longer leaping off a stone to the unknown, but balancing on the arch rubble. I also glued a couple of resin skulls to the base to give it some flavour.

The model's right arm was also reposed, mainly because I don't care that much for the original bent arm pose, made up for movie posters to fit the actor's face and the gun in the same picture. The straight arm looks more relaxed in my opinion.
The model will be painted in the following week and I'll append this post once it's finished.

Three Deathwatch Veterans, painted

When I started painting miniatures, I initially thought painting simple black Space Marine armour would be easy, until I tried it. I had no idea how to highlight black, and without highlighting it, the miniatures looked flat and just wrong. Naturally, I went too far to the opposite direction and decided painting black is really difficult, going as far as mixing a separate dark metallic colour for the Chaplains of my Space Marine chapter.

Of course, at the time, my brushes were of very poor quality, and my hand wasn't very steady either, so after painting a few Space Wolves, I tried my hand at painting some Wolf Priests, I found that black is actually fairly simple, and can be accomplished with simple drybrushing, or just highlighting in layers. With Deathwatch, I ended up using the same highlight method as seen on GW's YouTube channel, because it's neutral, but has a little bit of colour to it.

The Raven Guard veteran was the first one that I painted, which worked out well, since when I chose the company and team markings, the model's cloak got somewhat in the way. I probably could have used any of the other marking styles as well, but the diagonal red line of the Watch Company Quartus worked out the best. I also decided to freehand the team number rather than to bother with transfers. As it turned out, the font is surprisingly easy to paint.

 The Red Scorpion veteran was the second one I painted. The bright colours of the shoulder pad were a little challenging, especially since in the raised areas they were easy to accidentally wipe away, but not too difficult in the end.

The Space Wolf veteran would have been the most difficult one, had I not had plenty of practice with painting bare heads and wolfy talismans. As it was, the black armour made the model somewhat easier to paint than an average Space Wolves model.
I also used two different shades of grass tufts on this model, as well as the Red Scorpion. I recently bought a pack of Winter and Frozen tufts to go with my earlier Highland tufts, allowing me to glue a very simple gradient of different colours of grass on bases if needed. That should come in handy with future terrain projects.

Three Deathwatch Veterans with Stalker Pattern Bolters

I was making Deathwatch models with GW's old metal upgrade kit long before the new Codex came out, so naturally, I preordered the Codex and bought a Veterans kit soon after. Generally speaking, I liked the new sprues, though I was disappointed to see it only included one Stalker pattern bolter and two shotguns. Then I remembered Forgeworld's Legion Recon Squad, which I had wanted to do something with for a while already, but didn't really have the need for, since Space Wolf Scouts don't use power armour, and I don't need five Wolf Guard Pack Leaders.
However, the Recon Squad's extra shotguns and bolters with suppressors really did come in handy for a couple of Kill Teams. Of course, having the Maximus pattern power armour seems a little unusual for Deathwatch, but in my headcanon, Mk.IV is stealthier than Mk.VIII, at least until proven otherwise.
The main problem with the recon squad models is that all of them have one of their shoulder pads at least partially covered by the cloak. As both shoulder pads are somewhat more meaningful for Deathwatch marines than most others, this posed a slight problem.
Four out of the five models had their right shoulder pads covered, though, which meant I could work with that, assuming I could find another way to convey which Chapter the veteran comes from. Since Space Marine chapters are about as gimmicky as they get, that shouldn't be a problem.

 The first one I started working on, and the only one whose right shoulder pad is visible, was the Red Scorpions veteran. It made sense to have at least one of the Mk. IV wearing Marines be a Red Scorpion, since the Chapter really seems to like the armour pattern. I gave him a Deathwatch power pack instead of the Mk.IV recon model.
The left shoulder pad was only partially covered, so I carved out the shoulder, replaced it with a Deathwatch pad and resculpted the cloak over it.

 The Raven Guard's Chapter is not obvious at this stage yet, though I plan to paint the Raven Guard badge on his left greave. I wanted to give the model the Mk.VI helmet, since that's the Raven Guard's thing. Considering the Chapter's love of stealth, I feel like the Stalker pattern bolter and the camo cloak fits him well.

If there was one Chapter I knew I could make recognizable, it was the Space Wolves. Regardless, I still considered using the plastic Kill Team bits for him just to make it explicitly clear that he comes from Erik Morkai's Great Company, but eventually, I decided it wouldn't matter that much. In addition to the head from the Space Wolves upgrade sprue, gave him a wolf's head hood, a couple of tail talismans and a other bits and pieces.

I expect it shouldn't take long to paint the black armoured Marines, assuming my can of spray undercoat doesn't run out. I aim to finish them by next Sunday.

Three Eldar Harlequins, painted

The first models of any new army are always the most challenging ones to paint. They establish the way you're going to paint the other ones. Sure, you can and will always improve your techniques, but you will have to do it subtly enough that the older models still share a consistent look with the newer ones.
As I guessed last week, I ended up painting my Harlequins as members of the Masque of the Twisted Path. Being known for allying with non-Eldar and for fighting against the Thousand Sons, they are about as natural an ally for my Space Wolves as Harlequins are ever going to be, which is still not very. Besides the frosty bases, I don't really expect to tie the two armies together too much.

 The combination of motley and gradient is not a simple one to pull off. I eventually ended up painting the diamonds first, as described in GW's YouTube tutorial here, then drybrushing the area with thinned down White Scar and finally carefully repainting the black diamonds.

 I decided that my first troupe would be the Twilight Troupe, as evidenced by the rune on the Troupe Master's knee. Admittedly, it was a little strange that he has a shuriken pistol magazine on his belt, but isn't wielding a shuriken pistol. I imagine him throwing the magazine to one of the other players gracefully during a firefight.

The Harley Quinn harlequin ended up looking pretty good, even though purple isn't in the DC Comics character's colour scheme, and honestly, she should have a laughing mask. For now, however, this will do, at least until I custom sculpt a laughing mask with more feminine features and make another go at the character.

I already am working on a Starweaver for a transport for these guys, and the kit still makes another three Harlequins, so there will definitely be more in the future.

Two Eldar Harlequins and a Troupe Master

So I decided to take a little break from the armies of the Imperium, and the one army that interested me the most was the Eldar Harlequins. They balance out my Space Wolves well with their trickery and androgynous look. I haven't quite decided on the masque yet, though the Twisted Path seems a likely candidate at the moment, as the common enemy in the Thousand Sons would make it somewhat plausible to ally them with my Space Wolves.

 First, the Troupe Master. I was a little disappointed by the fact that there was only one troupe master torso, and it was a male (well, boobless) torso. I chose to arm the model with a Harlequin's Caress, since the he has more attacks than other members of the troupe, and a Neuro Disruptor due to his higher ballistic skill.

 Harlequins, at T3 and with just a 5++ save, are quickly killed by shooting, so I decided to have at least a couple of models with no upgrades in the troupe. This was the first one. Incidentally, I didn't notice that there was a nearly identical model in the assembly instruction until after I had made this one. I probably would have made it differently if I had noticed it, but didn't want to bother to go back.

I'm pretty sure most Harlequin players have had the same idea, but I wanted to have a Harley Quinn model in the troupe. I originally wanted her to be the Troupe Master, but the master's chestpiece and Harley's established DC Comics female character physique meant that wasn't to be.
I gave the model a Harlequin's Embrace, but left the shuriken pistol, as I don't want to put too many eggs in one basket.

I hope to paint these by the end of the week, depending on how tough the diamond pattern turns out to be. We'll know more next Sunday.

Terrain pieces

While the actual models take the priority for me as well as most people, I sometimes like to take the time to make some new terrain pieces, too. After all, they do have a huge effect on the visual appeal of a game, possibly even more so than the models.
This time around, I decided to make a couple of new trees, one of them by itself, the other connected to a barb wire barrier.

GW's resin skull sprue comes with a few ready-made piles of skulls, for which I have some trouble finding a use in basing. For this one, I decided to have a small tree growing over and around them. Maybe the tree was planted over a shallow mass grave, or maybe the scene speaks of a less than wholesome ritual. I'm not making a declaration one way or another.
With my previous tree, I found the branches didn't exactly look like coniferous trees, as they were a little too thin and regular shaped. I decided to glue some sand to the branches on this one.

The extra bulk brought by the sand made the brances look a lot better and more coniferous.
I used Doombull Brown to drybrush the bark, which, through the red tint, gave the tree a lot more pine-like appearance.


I plan to append this post a few times. The other terrain piece is still unpainted and will remain a lower priority for the time being, but I do intend to finish it.

Three Grey Hunters, painted

Though Codex Deathwatch was released a few weeks ago already, I still haven't really started building my Kill Teams for it. I have one plastic kit, and I recently made a related order from ForgeWorld, but it will still be a while before I'll get to it.
In the meantime, I'll keep building up my main army, as evidenced here by me finishing another pack of Grey Hunters.

 All of the models in this batch had somewhat unusual knee pads. This model's right knee's zigzag pattern didn't really correspond to the pack markings, so I decided to make it an honour marking instead. I decided against repeating the pack marking on the left kneepad, painting Ragnar Blackmane's army badge there instead.

 This model had plenty of warm tones on his shoulders and kneepads, so I decided to paint the gem in his chest blue for contrast. I noticed the right side of his face was a little rough, so I painted some reddish scar tissue there to explain it.

 The meltagunner's face was painted black, even though there was another model with Mk.VI helmet in the pack with a black face already, although without the wolf tail crest or the runes on his face. I decided the two warriors would have been recruited from the same tribe, with the meltagunner having seniority.

Here's a shot of the entire pack. Instead of just having them standing around, I decided to arrange them in a fighting formation. I think they may come in handy with the new Kill Team rules now out.