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Ork Warboss

Posted by johnnya10 on 19/09/2021
Posted in: My Painting and Modelling. Tagged: . Leave a comment

ork boss

I really do love painting Orks. Not only do they remind me of that time long ago when silly things were truly appreciated in 40k, but they give me the chance to exercise my own silliness too. And boy are they fun to paint. Bright colours, oversized features, bonkers weapons… I love it.

I’ve had the Orruk Megaboss sat on my “to do” list for a while now, and I fancied doing a little creative storytelling in paint and conversion recently, and it got me thinking about using this mini to help tell the awesome story of Rynn’s World. So I got choppin’ and then reached for the yellow – it was time for a new Warboss.

big choppa conversion

I kept the conversions simple – less is often more, and there were so many parts of the original megaboss model that I wanted to keep that I didn’t want to go too nuts. The one you may notice first is the big choppa (or is it a spinna) that was borrowed from a Deffdred (I doubt he’s getting it back through). It’s incredibly impractical really, but when did that ever stop an ork? I also gave him a top knot and a banner pole, along with a big orky symbol on the shoulder that doesn’t have the giant dragon skull on it. There’s als oa few wires and things here and there to help show off his 40k-ness, and then there’s the robot arm.

This was a fun little bit of storytelling, I thought. On Rynn’s World, during the Waaagh! everyone is fighting (or more likely fleeing from) the orks. So I thought about an Ambot used to hold off this rampaging boss while some folk tried to make it to safety. In the fight, the Ambot cut off the boss’s arm, but the ork was eventually victorious. Game recognising game, the ork ripped off the robot’s arm and instructed a Dok and a Mek to attach it to him. It’s even a crimson colour – a fist, that’s sort of crimson. Nice.

yellow ork armour

So we can place this guy as a combat monster, and that means he’s bound to have a few scrapes and scuffs and a fair bit of blood (other people’s) on him too, and that meant weathering. Aside from testing things out on the checkered knee, all the weathering happened last and after doing what i thought was a fairly decent job painting the armour, it was off to go in and mess it all up again. To show you what that transformation looked like, I took a before and after shot to show you the transition:

weathering ork armour

Sorry as always for the slightly out of focus photography, but you can certainly see what changed. And again, storytelling through painting goes into it. I like the scuffs around his jaw armour to represent the shots taken by Space Marines trying to stop him, though no head shot managed to make it through.

orruk megaboss conversion

I had a little more fun with freehand here, but only in the form of some patterns on the rear armour. Why mainly on the rear? I imagined this ork saying “Don’t put da fancy stuff in front coz it’ll get shot at – put it at da back so da runts behind know wot a rich git I is dat I can have dis fancy arma!” and that convinced me.

The base is simple enough, just a bit of Space Marine leftovers and a couple of other things to bring it into the setting. Poor, poor Crimson Fists.

ork on rynns world

Anyway, there you have it. I had a whole bunch of fun with this one. In terms of painting progress, I managed to get some really nice blends in the reds and yellows across this mini. Still need to work on my orky flesh but overall I think it all worked out ok. B- maybe for me. Potentially still a C+ but I just had so much fun working on this miniature that I think it maybe gets a little extra.

I hope you’re having just as much fun painting as I am, and I hope you’re enjoying an excellent weekend. Until we speak again; Onwards.

Lazy Painter’s Army List: Stormcast Eternals

Posted by johnnya10 on 11/09/2021
Posted in: Lists and Tactics. Tagged: . Leave a comment

Ok, this may well have been the easiest Lazy Painter’s list I’ve ever put together, due mainly to the amount of choice you have in the new Stormcast Eternals Battletome (that GW were good enough to send me) and the points cost of the models. I actually made some decent lists at very low model counts but then I worked this one out and I couldn’t not put it up here because it does kind of fit in with all of the Lazy Painter rules for creating an army. There are very (VERY) few miniatures, the vast majority of them are new, there’s not too much repetition here (there literally couldn’t be due to the low number of models) and while I can’t promise you it will win games, I can promise you that it’ll be fun finding out. 

stormcast eternals battletome

I also feel like I should add another rule – If you can take dragons in your list, you should do, because dragons are cool. You can probably now guess where I’m going with this one, so without further ado, let’s take a look.

Leaders 

Karazai the Scarred looks like a boss. This gnarly old dragon likes to scrap and boy does he have some tools to help him with that. How about the fact that all melee weapons that target him have their attacks characteristic reduced by 1 (to a minimum of 1)? Or the fact that his “Annihilating Jaws” have a to hit roll of 1+ when he’s not lost more that 8 of his 18 wounds (and they cause some real damage too). He is a powerhouse of a miniature and absolutely the general for this army. And if that’s not enough, we’re also going to be taking along a Lord Celestant on Stardrake which is still as brutal as it always has been. That Rain of Stars attack – love it, man.

Battleline 

Whether we choose to take Karazai or the Stardrake as our General, it doesn’t matter because either one of them will make Stormdrake Guard battleline. So we’re taking three units of two Stormdrake Guard as our Battleline. These guys are also monsters in melee, and they too carry a ranged attack in the form of their mortal wound dealing Draconic Flamestorm. And to top that all off (literally), they’ve got a Stormcast with either a Warblade that does 6 attacks, or a lance that does 3 but also gets improved stats on the charge, riding them into battle. What’s not to love!?

Other Units

There aren’t any. That’s it. It’s literally eight (8) models.

Army List:

Karazai The Scarred (Leader, Behemoth)

Lord-Celestant on Stardrake (Leader, Behemoth)

2x Stormdrake Guard (Battleline)

2x Stormdrake Guard (Battleline)

2x Stormdrake Guard (Battleline)

Points: 1965 (so you’re giving up 35 points, but… dragons, yo)

Model Count: 8. Just 8. A Lazy Painter’s record so far. And they’re dragons, yo!

Army Name: Dragons, Yo

Additional Stuff: Like i said, I don’t know if this will win you games but you will have fun with this list. From a painting point of view, imagine how colourful and cool eight dragons could be, and with only seven Stormcast Eternals riding them, this should be quick and very enjoyable to paint.

karazai the scarred

On the playing side of things, at least your games won’t drag on (get it?) as you’ll either have immolated or smashed up everything in like 3 rounds tops, or you’ll be dead yourself. More time to get a pint in post game and talk about how cool it is fielding an army of eight dragons, right? Set up will be quick, you won’t have many rules to remember, and the look on your opponent’s face will be priceless. An army built for laughs which might just have something.

Does it have something? Or is this just too nuts to work? Let me know in the comments, and until next time, Onwards, yo! 

Lazy Painter’s Army List: Orruk Warclans

Posted by johnnya10 on 09/09/2021
Posted in: Lists and Tactics. Tagged: . Leave a comment

Having only just worked on a Greenskins list for 40k, it’s time to take the brand new Orruk Warclans battletome for a spin after Games Workshop very kindly sent me a copy. I’m not going to do any crazy challenges with this one, so we’re going for the old school rules here. We’re going to create a 2000 point list of fun things to paint, full of new models and it should be fun and even maybe effective to play with. If you’re like me and you’re not a fan of huge armies that take too long to paint, hopefully you can have some fun with this.

orruk warclans battletome

Now, when it comes to the Orruk Warclans armies, you have a choice to make before you start. There are four types of armies to choose from; Kruleboyz, Ironjawz, Bonesplitterz and The Big Waaagh! and the latter allows you to take units from all three of the other options. So I have a choice to make, but it’s pretty easy for me – it’s Big Waaagh! time, baby. Let’s run down the list, that I like to call ‘Fist Mouth’.

Leaders

The reason I am calling this army ‘Fist Mouth’ is due entirely to the two behemoth-borne leaders that will make this army particularly scary. First up, we have what I still regard to be one to the coolest models in the range, Gordrakk, The Fist of Gork. He remains an absolute combat monster with the destructive bulk of his Maw-krusha and all the attacks he comes with mean you can pretty much throw Gordrakk at whatever you don’t like and he will, at the very least, cause mayhem. But he won’t be alone because we’re also taking Gobsprakk, the Mouth of Mork. While not as fighty as Gordrakk, this swamp-dwelling, vulcha-riding wizard is a great backup. What’s more, with his nasty ability when it comes to unbinding spells (with the caster suffering D3 mortal wounds, or D6 on a 10+, he can be a real pain when it comes to magic-users) and all of the other gifts he comes with, your opponent won’t be able to focus on just one of these two top bosses.

gordrakk

We’re also going to throw in a couple of sub-leaders into this list as well, with an Orruk Warchanter who will have some Ironjawz units to inspire when he drops those beatz, and a Swampcalla Shamen with Pot-grot to conjure up some magic for your Kruleboyz. Also any list that includes a Pot-grot is a winner in my books.

Batteline

We’re going to keep this simple and take just the three mandatory units we’d need for a matched play game. We’ve got two units of five Brutes as our Ironjawz contingent who are just as tough and fighty as they ever were, and a unit of 10 Kruleboyz Gutrippaz who we probably want to have Wicked Hackas for that 3+ to wound (rather than the 4+ on the Wicked Sticka which does have an extra inch of range. All three of these units are slow moving, but they’ll also be pretty hard to get off objectives, especially with those support leaders that we have.

Other Units

The rest of this army is made up of some really fun units that all have different jobs to do. A unit of three Man-skewer boltboyz give you some handy ranged attacks to use to protect those slow moving troops. With 24” of range on their “aimed shot”, that’s really descent range to have. Then we’re taking three Gore-gruntas to help support Goredrakk a little bit. They’ve got a wicked charge and hit like a brick so they should worry your opponents for a little while at least. Lastly we’re taking the Marshkrawla Sloggoth which is a miniature I just adore – it’s truly horrible and that’s great for the Kruleboyz. What’s more, it has abilities that will work well with the entire army, from using it’s drummer to add 1 to the hit rolls of ALL allies (so Ironjawz too), it’s ability to heal wounds every turn, and it’s got some decent attacking options as well.

sloggoth

The List:

Gordrakk, Fist of Gork (Leader/Behemoth)

Gobsprakk, Mouth of Mork (Leader/Behemoth)

Orruk Warchanter (Leader)

Swampcalla Shaman and Pot-grot (Leader)

5x Orruk Brutes (Battleline)

5x Orruk Brutes (Battleline)

10x Gutrippaz (Battleline)

3x Man-skewer Boltboyz

3x Orruk Gore-gruntas

Marshcrawla Sloggoth 

Points: Bang on 2000

Model Count: A very lazy-painter-friendly 32 miniatures and one of those is a Pot-grot. Granted, two of them are absolutely massive but it still counts because they’re a lot of fun.

Army Name: Fist Mouth

Additional Stuff: I genuinely like the look of this army, and I’m very tempted by going down this route myself as I think it would play to my strengths. You’ve got a big blob of hard to shift, constantly buffed battleline units that, while slow, will be very hard to kill, and a fast moving, hard hitting contingent to get the krumpin’ going early doors. What’s more, you can make both an Ironjawz Fist and a Kruleboyz Finga core battalion out of this army which does give you plenty of boons. 

orruk battalions

Having Gordrakk and Gobsprakk on the field is going to make your opponent very worried and I guarantee that even if those two aren’t around at the end of the battle, they’ll have taken a huge chunk of your enemies with them. We got in plenty of new awesomeness in the form of all the Kruleboyz stuff, and the Ironjawz are a faction I’ve been a big fan of since they first appeared so this is a real win for me.

Ok, so there are no Bonesplitterz in this list but I really have no problem with that. They’re a natural horde army that doesn’t really fit into the “Lazy Painter” way of thinking and if we’re being honest, the models just don’t look great compared to the big guys and the swamp guys. 

You’ve got fast moving things, flying things, plenty of magic, monsters, troops and all compacted into 32 miniatures costing 2000 points. That’s not bad, right?!

Do you think we’re onto a winner with this list? Or do you think we’re stuck in the swamp? Let me know in the comments below, and until next time, Onwards!

Saint Katherine in the Field

Posted by johnnya10 on 08/09/2021
Posted in: My Painting and Modelling. Tagged: . Leave a comment
saint katherine

Well, it’s been a while since I tried to work on anything like this, so I’m happy to show it off to you here today. It’s nice to know that I can still get some real joy out of this kind of painting after some time away from it working on armies and fun little projects.

Rather than try and take on the awesome yet intimidating Triumph of Saint Katherine, I decided to try and paint a version of Saint Katherine after her triumph. Striding into battle in holy armour, hefting an ornate shield and her mighty blade and going to kick some heretic arse.

saint katherine not on triumph

Honestly, it’s the hair and face I’m happiest with on this mini. I like that some holy light is bursting out of her eyes because that meant I didn’t have to paint any pupils on those peepers and that’s great with me. Just a faint blue glow. And I was a bit worried about painting white hair but I knew it would stand out agains the red and black really nicely. It turned out really nicely so that’s great with me.

The sword was a bit of a cop out – I went with a weathered bronze look and it’s fine, but very low tech. I was going to do glowing blue but I thought the verdigris would work out ok. It’s fine, but I think I was a little lazy going in that route. And the weathering goes between relatively well done and lazy too – getting green/grey dust on red armoured feet is tricky.

freehand shield

And yes, there’s the shield. I had a couple of hours free this afternoon, so after shaving off the design that’s on there, I just decided to go for it and paint Canoness Veridyan on there, based on the classic John Blanche artwork. It’s not perfect, but hopefully at least recognisable. It’s a relatively tricky painting to work with because it is rather stylised and that can make it hard to get the proportions right at the end of your brush, but I reckon it’s decent enough.

There’s a whole bunch I could improve on this miniature but I’m going to give myself a C+ here. Definitely a pass, and hopefully a good jumping of point for the next piece. I’m quite happy to be back painting like this, so let’s see where this mood takes me. Until the next one, be excellent to everyone, enjoy your painting, and have fun. Onwards.

Lazy Painter’s Army List: Orks

Posted by johnnya10 on 04/09/2021
Posted in: Uncategorized. Leave a comment

Well, we all knew I’d have to try and tackle this one eventually, and while I’m relishing the challenge, the idea of doing a Lazy Painter’s Army List for the Orks is, well, daunting shall we say. This isn’t going to be an easy one, but I’m going to give myself a goal here. I am going to create an Ork Army list for 9th Edition Warhammer 40,000 with no more than 30 miniatures. I’m sweating just saying that.

ork codex

I’m going to give myself another caveat with this one – I don’t have to try and use the new hotness. Normally, I try and work in at least some of the miniatures if a range has had a big revamp or addition, and while the beastly boys are now bolstering the codex (and they look awesome), having had a quick look at them, there aren’t many that cost too many points and so that will make my job next to impossible. So, using the brand new book that Games Workshop have kindly sent me, I’m going to make a Lazy Painter’s Army list for the Orks. Wish me luck.

HQs

We are of course taking big Ghaz. He’s a monster on the battlefield and he clocks in at 300 points which is very handy. And because Ghazghkull is in here, we can take the cheap Makari, who is an HQ choice in his own right, without taking up an additional HQ slot. That’s handy as we’re not going to be running a Battalion here and there are some other good HQ options here, though I can’t take anything else with the “Warboss” keyword because the big fella would smash him up proper. So instead, I’m going for a Big Mek with a Shokk Attack Gun, assisted ably by a Grot Oiler. I love that gun because it holds a true measure of Orky bonkers-ness and the current model is pleanty nice too.

Elites

We’re skipping troops choices because they’re just too cheap and I’ve already used up 4 on my minis with my HQ choices. As much as I love a good mob of boyz or grotz, I’m instead going to be taking two units of 5 Mega-armoured Nobz. Chonky as you like, all equipped with Kombi-Skorchas and killsawz, these units will look like a real threat and they might even be able to soak up some firepower from my enemies. 

Flyer

In order to keep the attention away from my big Nobz (don’t) I’m going to take a fully-kitted out Wazbom Blastajet. This’ll be rocking a couple of Supa-shootas, a pair of Tellyporta Mega-blastas, and a force field too. What’s more, I’m likely to make this a “Specialist Mob” which means he’ll gain the Flyboyz rule and this gives him a bonus when being shot at by always giving him the benefits of light cover if the person shooting at him is more than 6” away. Nice.

Fast Attack

A nice big mob of six Warbikers will do for me, with the Nob rocking a Power Klaw. Along with the flyer, this gives me some fast moving things that will distract my enemies and cause havoc where needed. Bikers are great miniatures and so much fun to paint that I certainly don’t mind having a mob of six of them in here.

Heavy Support

Yep, we’re taking advantage of the Orks’ great choices in the heavy area by making this a Spearhead Detachment. First off, we’re taking a Bonebreaka with all the fixins – so many that I’m not going to bother listing them here but this tank is packing some serious firepower and even a wreckin’ ball for good measure. Next up, a group of 3 Deff Dreads, each taking a Kustom Mega Blasta and some Rokkits to add to their firepower. And lastly, a group of 5 Lootas, with their boss rocking Rokkit Launcha. The lootas were pretty much the only thing I could sandwich in with the points I had left and I just like ‘em. I like them as much as my spellcheck hates everything I just wrote. 

The List:

HQ: Ghazghull Thraka & Makari

HQ: Big Mek with Shokk Attack Gun & Grot Oiler

Elites: 5x Meganobz with Kombi-Skorchas and Killsaws

Elites: 5x Meganobz with Kombi-Skorchas and Killsaws

Flyers: Wazbom Blastajet with 2 Supa-Shootas, 2 Tellyport Mega-Blastas and a Force Field

Fast Attack: 6x Warbikers with a Power Klaw

Heavy Support: Bonebreaker with a Killkannon, 4 Big Shootas, a Lobba and a Wreckin’ Ball

Heavy Support: 3x Deff Dreads, each with a Kustom Mega Blasta and a Rokkit Launcha

Heavy Support: 5x Lootas with a Rokkit Launcha

Points: 1980 but you can use the 20 points on a Kustom Job (I like da Red Rolla for the Bonebreaker but you have options)

Model Count: 29! I did it! A 2k Ork army with less than 30 minis! 29!! 

Army Name: Big Ghaz Comes To Town

Additional Stuff: So Ghaz has to be the warboss, and that means you want to take this army as Goffs. This means you add 1 to the Warord’s attacks, and each time Ghaz goes into melee, you can improve his ap by 1. 

goff rules

How it plays: To be honest, I don’t see this army win too much. Orks work great with big hordes of boyz and at least one of their Lords of War. That being said, an experienced player may well be able to get something out of this. The jet, bikes and Bonebreaker surge foreward and worry the enemy, while the Shokk Attack gun, Lootas and Deff Dreads unleash a lot of firepower. By the time your enemies deal with that lot, Ghaz, Makari and all those Meganobz will have had time to get up close and in melee, that lot will cause havoc, especially with Ere We Go helping to ensure they get into combat. 

But like I said, it’s not a conventional ork army, so whether or not it works, is very situational. But if you want an ork army that doesn’t mean painting 60 boyz, this might be a good bet. And hey, if you want to work in some Beast Snaggas, it won’t be too hard, but it will mean more minis. 

Do you think this ork list can work well? Is it possible to run a low mini-count ork list? Let me know in the comments below. And until next time, Onwards! 

My 2000 Point Necron Army

Posted by johnnya10 on 31/08/2021
Posted in: My Painting and Modelling. Tagged: . Leave a comment
2000 point necron army

You know me. I don’t do big projects. Half the time I can barely make it to the end of a single miniature so the idea of a squad of five usually gives me the fear. So how is it then that I have painted myself a 2000 point Necron army? Well, I picked a method and I stuck with it. It’s simple, easy to follow, enjoyable to do and I really like the miniatures. If you’d told me when I picked up Indomitus that the first thing I’d paint would be the Necrons, I probably would have called you bonkers but that box was the catalyst.

So it’s essentially 95% of the Indomitus Necrons, a couple of croissants and a few minis that I just really like. It’s not meant to be “competitive” but I’ve played with them before and I can tell you that they are a lot of fun to use. I don’t have to worry about a psychic phase, everything has LD10 and they are nice and forgiving thanks to things like Living Metal and Reanimation Protocols. Anyway, before I waffle on too long, let’s take you through the army. 

HQs

necron overlord
plasmancer
skorpekh lord

Three of the four from the Indomitus box (I’m saving the other dude for a fancy project later on). We’ve got your classic Overlord there with his big stick, then there’s floaty mortal wound dealing Not-A-Psyker, and Mr Murderbot 3000 with all the weapons. Each one offers their own fun aspect of play and I’m quite happy with the little distinctions here, including Mr Murderbot’s glowing red eyes.

Elites

necron reanimator
cryptothralls
skorpekh destroyers
c'tan nightbringer

I run this army as a battalion to get those sweet sweet command points maxed out, but I’ve also pretty much maxed out my elite options. I’ve got the Reanimator which, might do something useful? I’ve got the medium-sized Murderbots along with the Baby Murderbot that makes them better. I’ve got the Trashcan Vampires (I think I stole that line from Goonhammer btw) who hang around with the Not-A-Psyker, and then there’s the Grim Reaper’s Ghost who looks like a complete bastard when it comes to the rules. That’s a lot of elite things right there.

Troops

necron warriors
more necron warriors
necron immortals

Two groups of 10 warriors and 5 immortals with Tesla guns. I know people say you should do bigger units but I’m not going to so there.

Fast Attack

necron wraiths
necron scarabs
triarch praetorians

Ancient shuffling robot zombies can be surprisingly speedy it turns out and so I’ve got plenty of fast moving things in my army. Got the Floaty Ghost Bois as standard, and a nice little tarpit of six Murderbugs. And there are 5 Speedy Spear duders in there as well who are well good at smashing things up.

Croissants 

doomscythe
annihilation barge

There’s the big Flying Croissant who is in there purely because I was never going to not have a gun that’s literally called a Death Ray in my army. And then there’s the Mini-Croissant who is there to get me to exactly 2000 points. I guess the big gun’ll be useful at some point.

So there you have it! 2000 points of Necrons painted with minimum effort (and described to you there with even less effort than that) in order to have some fun games. I’ve taken them for a spin before and they were really decent so looking forward to having another go very soon. Onwards!

Emperor’s Children Champion

Posted by johnnya10 on 24/08/2021
Posted in: My Painting and Modelling. Tagged: , . Leave a comment
emperor's children champion

In an effort to get back into a bit of painting, I’ve gone old school and had a crack at a classic metal mini – the Emperor’s Children Champion. And despite the old school Eavy Metal backdrop, you’ll be happy to know I still suck at photography so these are the best you’re getting.

I started this a while back as part of a Heresy vs Heroes challenge against VioletSun on Twitter and I have to thank her for her patience as I am now about three months late with this one I think. The hobby mojo isn’t fully back, but this is a start and it was a lot of fun. I went back to the days when guns were red, barrels were yellow, metallic paints weren’t used and banners were made of paper. It was fun to once again revisit the days of goblin green bases.

slaaneshi champion

I even managed to squeeze some leopard print in there. That was a nice touch I thought. I had to build the banner pole from scratch and I’m not particularly fond of the final banner there (it looks a bit too anime for my tastes) but the good thing about paper banners is that they can be redone, swapped out, etc. I tried fr “daemon” and got a Yu-gi-oh character instead. Will improve on the next one.

To be honest, there’s not much more to say. It’s nowhere near my best work, but it’s not bad for a little display piece done by someone who hasn’t been trying for three months. Hopefully it will prove to be a jumping off point and I’ll be able to do something better next time.

old slaanesh mini

There are a few nice touches here and there so that’s why I’m happy to show it off. And long time readers will know of my enjoyment of Slaaneshi stuff from many moons ago.

I don’t know what’s next, but when I’ve got something painted, you’ll see it here first. I hope you’re having fun with the hobby, and until next week, onwards!

Quick and Easy Death Korps of Krieg

Posted by johnnya10 on 09/08/2021
Posted in: Tutorials, Uncategorized. Tagged: , . Leave a comment

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ll have seen the brand new Death Korps of Krieg miniatures from the upcoming Kill Team release. I was lucky enough to be sent a copy of the new Kill Team box and while a full review will come at some point, it’s important to acknowledge that the miniatures inside got me painting again. The Death Korps have always been a favourite of mine since I first read about them in Warriors of Ultramar many moons ago. I never got round to painting any, but with this box, I was determined to give them a go. What’s more, I wanted to come up with an easy and quick scheme to help you paint yours.

Before we dive in, I just want to say that the miniatures and scenery are worth buying this box for alone. Even if the game’s a lot of fun, the minis are fantastic. You get loads of options with the Death Korps and my bits box has swelled with spares after this, but the level of detail is exceptional. I would caution you that they could be very fiddly, but they don’t need to be – you get needle thin bayonets and a tiny rack of medals, but you don’t need to include those if you don’t want to. Can’t wait to see what can be done with the orks!

On to the tutorial. Like I said, this is meant to be quick and simple scheme but we want them to look decent too. And there is that odd thing about the Death Korps that they draw us to paint them like they’ve been transplanted from the early 20th century and placed in the 41st Millennium. My advice is to just lean into that because it’s pretty hard to do otherwise – why fight it, but maybe use the good guys as your source of inspiration.

Green Coat

We’re starting with the green coat here. When trying to do something quickly and simply, working from larger areas to smaller areas helps a lot, and this is quite fun because you don’t need to worry too much about staying within the lines. I didn’t. But I did use a couple of thin coats of Waaagh! Flesh to get a solid green base all over the coat. I then used Militarum Green contrast paint to cover the whole thing. Once that was dry, I took very, very thin (like super watery) Straken Green to highlight the higher areas. And that’s that done. Pretty simple so far, right?

Green Trousers

Super easy this, but you do have to be neater with this step. Just paint the trousers. A couple of thin coats of Straken green were applied, then covered with Athonian Camoshade. Once that shade paint was dry, I touched up the higher areas with Straken Green and then used a blend of Straken Green with a little Flash Gitz Yellow in it to hit the very highest areas with a spot highlight. Why use yellow instead of white to lighten the green? It just looks a bit more military-y to me and white in green invariable ends up looking like a type of toothpaste.

The Leathers

Next up, the leather areas. There’s a lot of them, with pouches, coat flaps, boots, belts… so be sure to hit them all. Base with a couple of thin coats of Rhinox Hide, then drybrush lightly with XV88 before covering them with an undiluted wash of Seraphim Sepia. And you’re done.

The Metals

Ok, this isn’t super quick and simple but once you get into the swing of things, it gets a lot easier. Base coat everything with Leadbelcher. Then you’re going to want to do a sort of TMM thing here but in a kind of quick and slightly sloppy way. Rather than explain that, I’m just going to link to this video from Ben Komets and Painting Buddha that shows you far better than I how to do it but you do not need to be anywhere near as neat as a Slayer Sword winner. The paints I used to help me were Iron Warriors, an Iron Warriors/Abaddon Black 50/50 mix, and then an Abaddon Black pinwash followed by a highlight of Ironbreaker.

Next, I covered most areas with a 50/50 mix of Skeleton Horde and Contrast Medium to make it look grimy. But a few areas (buttons, aquilas, etc) I used some Nazdreg Yellow straight out of the pot. And that’s all the metallics.

death korps of krieg

Finishing Up

Yep, we’re nearly done. There’s a few little bits to do and then the basing. Paint the gas mask tube black and give it some grey highlights. Paint the eye lenses black and then cover them in Ardcoat. The wooden stock on the gun is Rhinox Hide with streaks of some other browns and beiges (your choice) covered in a thin coat of Agrax Earthshade. And that’s it for the finer details.

For the base, I used a basecoat of Dawnstone, with a few larger rocks picked out in Eshen Grey before washing it all with some Athonian Camoshade. When this was dry, I highlighted with Dawnstone and then Administratum Grey. The barbed wire was painted with Iron Warriors, then areas were covered with Typhus Corrosion before dabbing those still wet areas with Fire Dragon Bright. Ironbreaker was used to highlight the barbs.

Quick and Easy

What do you reckon? It genuinely didn’t take me long to do this, and if you’re batch painting the 10 of them in this box, this could be a very quick way to get them all done. Hopefully, at least one of these quick and easy techniques can be of some use to you.

The metallic step is a wee bit faffy but once you get into the swing of things, it really goes by fast. I’ve already started the batch painting process and as I’m usually incapable of painting 10 of anything, and I don’t want to just give up on them straight away, it must be decent enough, right?

I hope that is in some way useful and as mentioned I look forward to writing a larger review of this in the future. As ever, stay excellent. Onwards.

Lazy Painter’s Army List: Thousand Sons

Posted by johnnya10 on 07/08/2021
Posted in: Lists and Tactics. Tagged: . Leave a comment

Well this is a curious one. I’ve played a lot of Chaos armies in my time, but I’ve never looked into Tzeentch and the Rubric Marines of the Thousand Sons. I’ve played against them maybe once or twice, but I really don’t know anything about how they really operate, and especially not in 9th Edition 40k. But, GW sent me the new Thousand Sons codex so I suppose I better have a go at making one of our Lazy Painter’s lists. But I’m giving myself some caveats with this one. First off, I’m not taking Magnus. Yes, he’s a big chunk of points but, I dunno, I don’t like how he pulls the army apart a bit. Does that make sense? Probably not. Either way though – no Magnus.

Also, I actually want to try and do a Battalion for once. I usually go for Vanguard or Spearhead detachment but here, I want to see what I can do to take the full 12 command points into the game. We’ll still try and keep the model count to an absolute minimum, but we want some objective secured troops in here and a good blend of tactical options. Let’s see what we can do.

HQs

First up, we have to take Ahriman on his disc. The disc makes him faster and fightier which is nice and honestly I just love the model. He’s full of character and a natural leader for this army – definitely the warlord here. And those 3 psychic powers he can cast per turn will help a lot as well.

ahriman

Then we’re taking a pair of daemon princes with wings and swords*. They’re a classic chaos HQ, and two of them are enough to scare anyone. And that sword giving each of them 5 base attacks at S8 is just tasty. Proper tasty. This also starts a theme that runs through this army. Let’s just say I’m thinking of these princes as twins…

Troops

Three squads of five Rubric Marines. They’re all running identical loadouts with each squad taking an Icon of Flame, the Sorcerer is packing a Warpflame Pistol, and one of the marines is toting a Soulreaper Cannon. The Icon will help with the magic stuff (not something I’m up with yet but this appears to be very useful to have three of these in the list), and the Warpflame Pistol and Soulreaper are in there to look cool. I mean, they should kill a lot of things too, but really they’re in there because I like the look of them.

Flyers

Two Heldrakes with each one breathing fire with a baleflamer. No, they’re not as devastating as they used to be, but alongside the daemon princes and Ahriman on his disc, I’ve got five things in this army that can fly fast and rain down a lot of pain on my enemies. And again, I may be biased by my heretical roots, but I just think they’re still the coolest looking flyers in the game.

heldrake

Heavy Support

Two Maulerfiends with Lasher Tendrils. I’ve played lists with two Maulerfiends before and they always earn their points back and usually do more damage besides. Those fists crack armour like nothing else, and those lasher tendrils are great at preventing them from getting bogged down in tarpits. And with 10″ movement and an ability to ignore charge modifiers, it’s another fast one. Well, another fast two in this instance.

Elites

Two squads of five Scarab Occult terminators each with a Heavy Warpflamer and a Hellfyre Missile Rack. 3 Wound monsters with a lot of firepower and a 2+/5++ and the ability to cast more psychic powers, plus the fact they are awesome looking miniatures, these chaps may be dusty, but I reckon it’s gold dust. Imagine trying to clear that lot out of the centre of the battlefield.

scarab occult terminators

The List:

HQ: Ahriman on his disc

HQ: Daemon Prince with wings and sword

HQ: Daemon Prince with wings and sword

Troops: 5x Rubric Marines with an Icon, a Soulreaper and a fiery pistol

Troops: 5x Rubric Marines with an Icon, a Soulreaper and a fiery pistol

Troops: 5x Rubric Marines with an Icon, a Soulreaper and a fiery pistol

Elites: 5x Scarab Occult Termies with a missile rack and a heavy flamer

Elites: 5x Scarab Occult Termies with a missile rack and a heavy flamer

Heavy Support: Maulerfiend with Lasher Tendrils

Heavy Support: Maulerfiend with Lasher Tendrils

Flyer: Heldrake with Baleflamer

Flyer: Heldrake with Baleflamer

Points: bang on 2000

Model Count: 32 – not too shabby.

Army Name: The Flaming Twins of Tzeentch

Additional stuff: You can pick one of the Cults of the Legion profiles for yourself – I like the Cult of Scheming but there are lots of options. Same goes for relics and Infernal Pacts but with Ahriman as the warlord, he’ll have the Otherworldly Prescience rule which gives him a once per game 3+ invuln save which could certainly be helpful.

cult of scheming

How it plays: Well, I can tell you how I’d play it, which may not be the best guide but it should be fun. Everything fast runs up the field beating things up and setting things on fire (I do love the amount of flamers we have in this list) with psychic powers pinging off all over the shop, while the core of Rubrics and Terminators slowly advance and take objectives and offer a solid second wave of attacks.

I know in the past I’ve tried not to do too many duplicates of units, so it was weird copying/pasting all those entries into that list but I reckon you could have a lot of fun painting each pair as the opposite of each other. One heldrake is blue with yellow trim, while the other is yellow with blue trim. Same with the daemon princes, maulerfiends, and scarab occults. Then do a big blue classic blob of rubrics led by Ahriman. I can feel a theme coming through easily there and that always makes an army a treat to paint. I’ll just have to hope it’s a treat to play as well.

Do you think I’d do well with this? How does it stack up against the Grey Knights list from earlier today? Let me know in the comments. Have a great day, and be good to yourself and others. Onwards.

(*) Gah! I did not take into account the Jealous Tyrant rule which someone on twitter pointed out. So I can only take one Daemon Prince in a detachment. I’ve looked, and I like the idea of the army looking like this so much, I’m just going to take him as an auxiliary detachment and take the CP hit. I’m having me two daemon princes, gosh darn it!

Lazy Painter’s Army List: Grey Knights

Posted by johnnya10 on 07/08/2021
Posted in: Lists and Tactics. Tagged: . Leave a comment
grey knights codex

Ok, I’ll admit that I’ve been looking forward to this one. You see, not too long ago (well, 5th or 6th edition – one of those… maybe it was a long time ago) Grey Knights had one of the all time lazy painter army lists ever. It was called Draigo Wing and consisted of Kaldor Draigo, a couple of units of Paladins (which he made troop choices) and typically a Nemesis Dreadknight or two. A 2000 point army would consist of around 20-25 models and at one point it was also one of the best playing armies ever. People were terrified of facing this thing. So this should be a really fun challenge today – can we put together a 2000pt Draigo Wing army in 9th edition? Well, GW were nice enough to send me the new Codex, so let’s see what we can put together.

HQs

Of course, if we’re doing Draigo Wing, we need Kaldor Draigo – everyone’s favourite warp-bound screaming lunatic who will smash face with the best of them. He’s still ridiculously tanky in combat and in the hand-to-hand encouraging 9th edition, he’s a proper beast. That Titansword is looking very tasty, and the buffs he can give out are pretty nice too.

kaldor draigo

Alongside him, we’re taking a fully decked out Grand Master in Nemesis Dreadknight. The baby carrier warsuit is coming equipped with a Heavy Psycannon, Gatling Psilencer and a Nemesis Greatsword, along with a teleport homer for mobility. Yes, he clocks in at a lot of points but you get a fast, 13 wound, 6 attacks base monster with a 2+/4++. Not many people are going to want to get too close to him! Oh, and I’m giving him the Presaged Paralysis ability from the “Visions of Augurium” powers. This means that once per battle, I can stop my opponents using overwatch against him. Lol.

Elites

We’re taking 5 units of 5x Paladins here and while two squads will be decked out with a pair of incinerators and a lot of falchions, the third squad will be rocking 4x Nemesis Daemon Hammers and a Psycannon. I love that these guys now have 3 wounds each and add that to their similarly impressive statline and saves, these really are the elite of the elite. Oh and they of course get to pop psychic powers like almost everything else in the list. Two squads are decked out to churn through hordes with flame and sword, and the 3rd could go toe-to-toe with some of the biggest baddies in the game.

grey knight paladins

I’m also taking along an Ancient who can back up one of these units with his buffs in combat. Yes, it does mean buying a 4th box of Grey Knight Terminators but I think it’s worth it for the abilities here. Teleport this guy in with a squad you want to do extra extra damage in combat and you’ll be able to herd most opponents like cattle around the tabletop.

And last in the elites slot, but certainly not least, a Grey Knights Venerable Dreadnought with a heavy flamer on one fist and a tank killing twin-linked lascannon on the other arm. It’s always nice to find a way to squeeze a boxy dread into any list and this guy is definitely not just making up the numbers. Aside from the weapons, that’s yet another psychic power to pop off in that phase.

Heavy Support

Stick with the classics. A Nemesis Dreadknight with teleporter, Greatsword, Heavy Incinerator and Heavy Psycannon. It can go hard in hand-to-hand but boy can it also shoot good. Well worth the points. There’s not really much else to say about it – it will do what you need it to do.

nemesis dreadknight

Flyer

Because while almost everything here can teleport, having something zoomy and bulky in the skies above the battlefield always helps. And a Stormraven, it of the flying brick legend, is still a good buy even if you’re dropping a lot of points on it. But it does have twin lascannons and twin multi-meltas. Oh, and it can even drop our Venerable Dreadnought off somewhere if you want that chonky boi to have a bit of extra speed.

The List:

HQ – Kaldor Draigo

HQ – Grand Master in Nemesis Dreadknight with sword, heavy cannon, gatling psi and a teleporter + PP

Elites – 5x Paladins with 2x Incinerators and a lot of falchions

Elites – 5x Paladins with 2x Incinerators and a lot of falchions

Elites – 5x Paladins with 4x daemon hammers and a psycannon

Elites – Paladin Ancient with psycannon

Elites – Venerable Dreadnought with twin las and a flamer fist

Heavy Support – Nemesis Dreadknight with sword, heavy cannon, incinerator and a teleporter

Flyer – Stormraven Gunship with multi-meltas and twin las

Points: 2000 (well, it might be 1990 – my maths for this list did go a bit all over the shop – either way it’s good)

Model Count: 21. …21! I think I’m in love! That’s proper Draigo Wing numbers!

List Name: Draigo Wing 2021

I’ll let you work out what relics to take, and there’s also the “Brotherhoods” system which gives you access to specific strategems, warlord traits and psychic powers. I like the “Prescient Brethren” for this list but you might have other ideas. I was hoping the above would fit into one Vanguard detachment but alas it doesn’t – you can only have one Grand Master per detachment and that’s Draigo, so you have to sacrifice 2cp to take the other Grand Master as an auxiliary choice. If you don’t want to pay the CP, You could just slot in another underarmed suit and slip a Brotherhood Champion in there, so you’d keep the firepower, but you’d be up to 22 models then and that just feels like too many!

grey knights prescient brethren

How Does It Play?

To be honest, I reckon this will do very well. You’ve got enough hammers and swords to tear up anything else in combat, and with all the lascannons and psycannons, you could put down an army of superheavy tanks without too much issue. You can teleport a great chunk of it straight into you enemy lines, and if you’d rather sit back, let’s see how the enemy likes all those flamers and stormbolters. Ok, you have no objective secured, but do you think your opponent will have an army left after turn 3? I wouldn’t be so sure. And let’s not forget you’ll be popping off up to 8 psychic powers in that phase! And thanks to the Aegis, Mortal Wounds aren’t even as scary as they would be to other armies this small.

Honestly, at just 21 models, I am mega tempted by this. It’s a rules heavy army, so I’d need to remember a lot (which I’m not great at these days) but 21 models and that much hurt to dish out? Tempted. Genuinely tempted.

That’s your lot for this one. I hope you like the list. I love the fact that you can run a Draigo Wing type list in 2021 and 9th edition. Wonderful news indeed. Have a lovely rest of your day, and I’ll be back with more very soon. Onwards!