Monday 30 September 2013

DANGER :: Inquisitorial action imminent.

Oh dear,

Time may be right to start the final part of the trilogy.

Something happened this weekend - I got the idea for my third Inquisitor and POP, all of a sudden had the parts perfectly organized for him and the 4 henchmen. The most surreal modeling flow state where every idea was a very original mix of highly suitable concepts and themes. When ideas have been maturing in your head subconsciously for a long time, sometimes they rush out and it's thrilling. The model that started it was supposed to be something else...and is really not something that makes you think Inquisitor without modifications.

Well, lets see how it goes. My personal bar after Ugly and then Bad is VERY high for the Good and the most difficult concept to do justice to. I have a new and very different idea for the overall paint job too.

Migs

PS. I had decided it is time to revisit the Old Faithful Nurgle Lord. So I started building one and that impulse actually lead to the chain reaction above. Inquisitor Von Lochov just needs three plasma cannon "servitors". So this model has nothing to do with the trilogy - although I did entertain the idea - and then rejected it as each model across the trilogy really should be highly individual.

Hope you like the start of him. Plenty more work to do.





Friday 27 September 2013

Terrain and Forge World Wowsers

I recently had my birthday and my fantastic family remodeled our garage to have a nice little workspace for making bigger stuff and airbrushing. I also got myself an airbrush and a compressor. Unfortunately the compressor did not work out of the box, so I had to send it back.

While my childlike disappointment about not being able to try the new and long dreamed of aerial painting beast was profound, I did get into working on my Wall of Martyrs terrain set. And really enjoy the work GW is doing in the terrain space.

And then today I saw this in the Forge World newsletter:


And now I am massively excited about adding two new tiles to my recently finished realm of battle terrain board along with the Wall of Martyrs. The fort above and the entrenchment tile. Looks like the perfect vessels to practice the art of airbrushing too.

These should add up to a terrain set I am as happy with as the army. All I know need is some great chaps to play with. Too bad I can't import my old crew from Europe.

Stay tuned.

Tuesday 24 September 2013

Henchmen recruits - Nearly ready with a group of five.

Nearly done with the latest Legion recruits,

Nothing spectacular - but have been thoroughly enjoying these. I now have a collection of nearly 20 henchmen to choose from, with more on the way. It's funny these are 5pts a piece game-play wise - in that context plenty of effort, love and care. 

Photos are in so so lighting with the 5S camera which is absolutely brilliant I must say.





Monday 23 September 2013

100th Post : Centurions for the 1st Century!

Much to my surprise, this is the 100th Legion of Plastic post. The blog has 240 followers and has seen 125 000 ish visitors over the two or so years. It's proved out to be a great outlet to share my thoughts and work in relative calm, away from the warp currents of the big forums. Hopefully the second century will help grow the blog into even more activity, while maintaining the spirit.

I though I should share something worthy of the century. So here is a WIP of a Mechanicus Skitari Battle Suit, based quite obviously on the Space Marine Centurions, as well as two pictures that nicely sum up what this blog is about. The BAD retinue that was the big result 2012 and now the Legion army that has and continue to define my hobby output for 2013. And obviously, I had to share the desk again - it ties everything together for me in the hobby physically, much as the blog does digitally.

I also wanted to specifically mention the Forge World Heresy series and the Primarch models. The latest one, Ferrus Manus continues the absolutely stunning work that really redefines heroic for the marine range. There is reason to be very very excited for when eventually they do Alpharius. Or two...

Thank you for your interest, comments and all the inspiring work you share in your own blogs and/or forums.

Migs









Wednesday 11 September 2013

The Adeptus Astartes


The Adeptus Astartes




I received my new Space Marines and Codex and cannot help, but share some thoughts before diving in to building stuff again. Amazing work from Games Workshop and brilliant bitz for Legion.

Therein lies the biggest mistake Games Workshop has ever done - the incorrect Architecture for the most central imagery in the game - the plastic Space Marine. When Jes Released the current road map with his 98 classics, the world was quick to embrace the models as pinnacle of GW capabilities and largely blind that what Dainton, Kopinski and Boyd soon started was not at all captured in miniature form. A few years later the hobby reacted and the first corrective actions started appearing. Then in 2006 or so came a second wave built on the Terminator kits, but GW has not had the heart to reset.

Today, looking at my Alpha Legionnaires, next to an excuse built from the box, I’m left worndering how fucking fantastic things could have been. Utterly fantastic. 

But lets put that aside. The new kits are some of the best GW has ever produced, marvelous advancement in sharpness and mold quality, range of options and iconography and fantastic source material for everyone working with Space Marines - be it insanity like “Art-scaling” or just building from the box.

The Sternguard kit is loaded with gorgeous options, the Centurions have a really surprising level of detail and selection and the single frame characters continue the strenght of that line, but offer quite a bit of more flexibility to kit bash than some of the Fantasy counterparts. I rate this release very highly. Almost up there with the Dark Eldar and Ork onslaughts of recent years.  

The Codex on a quick glance is a land mark piece, much like the 6th edition rule book. There isn’t much new Art, but a great collection of the classics remastered to this new digital age with color and some amazing new one offs for each of the main chapters. The background is very rich and laid out like a great foundation to create your own chapters and storylines and the miniature section is long and comprehensive.

I have to wonder how the Codex Chaos Space Marines can be so bad in light of all the other sixth edition books (Eldar, Tau, Necrons all brilliant) is beyond my understanding. Massively more so now the loyal Chapters have their land mark tome. If I would be in charge, I would immediately admit to this internally and reshuffle the que to create something equally spctacular for the Renegades. Because these two books truly define everythign else. 

All this new space marine goodness has really made me wonder if there is anyway I could do a small force of marines that were just built as is. Sadly no. But I still enjoy and thoroughly appreciate the new releases and it will be a joy to see so much richness to people's armies.

I might allow a small detour to my Legion work now that I have the army together. Something really nice to enjoy the gorgeous new plastic sets. Working on it already.




Sunday 8 September 2013

Friday 6 September 2013

PIP - new Alpharius

Fresh off the iPhone, these guys are 80% done. Freehand markings next, then more darkening and definition layers, weathering and finally base. What is left is the absolute bliss part of painting these.


Thursday 5 September 2013

Next steps for the Twentieth Legion.

It's a nice feeling. Army in the bag. Satisfied, yet eager to out do the existing stuff after learning so much through the process. Now that I have critical mass, I can also spend (even) more time on individual things and have quite the list of things in planning.

Big news

  • I now have a full, high quality airbrush set up - will be looking into integrating this new tool with out everything looking airbrushed (a look I personally hate)
  • I have learned to use different pigments, filters and other tricks, but yet to make them really sing
Specific units being built or specifically planned
  • Imperial Guard Vendetta, incorporating everything I learned with the vehicles + the airbrush
  • 3 marines 75% painted
  • 3 henchmen 75% built
  • Second Cyclops Automaton (the big mechanicus robots brother)
  • Want to get bag to building the Dune Twists war mammoth
  • Henchmen chimera
  • The big trench system terrain set.
More vague in schedule and scope, but definitely in the to do list
  • Full Imperial Guard infantry platoon, if and when GW finally releases a new plastic regiment - the longest over due addition to the game IMO
  • Eldar allied detachment. Wraith heavy - complimentary color scheme, but still in moonlight
  • Bane blade or similar

Thoughts?

Monday 2 September 2013

Of the fabulous hydra it is said, cut off one head and two will grow in its place!

To do this - I need to go to the beginning - all the way. This post is part one of three reports of Legion reaching Army size. Second will be more musings, close ups on armor and three new Marines, and third my grand plan going forward. Before (or perhaps after) you dive into looking at the pictures, please grab your favorite Warhammer 40000 Codex, Rulebook or Art book. This should be the frame of reference as much as the other painted miniatures you see in the inter webs, or perhaps more so.




Thanks. And Sorry.





Founding (2009)

Of the fabulous hydra it is said, cut off one head and two will grow in its place” - antique proverb


Prelude - Ten Millenia of Memories

Rhisinne, great equatorial plains, two years after the Heresy.

The utter silence tuned into a screaming crescendo smoothly like a curtain unveiled before the act.  Fourteen Chimera Personnel carriers sat on the dry ground, their cargo perfectly lined up in front of them. The Stormbird touched down briefly. Clouded in dust it rose again and took away the crescendo. Silence. The dust settled and revealed five figures, two giants in  midnight plate, a Het of the Geno Chiliad, a robed man and a frail, incredibly elegant character. A sharp clasp sprung as 166 Elite Geno Guard snapped into attention with near inhuman precision behind the General Governor, Geno 4-4.

The fate of the system was decided between this conclave, with only the desert as the witness. No written or other document would ever reference this event. The true rule was established and the trials of  Vipera were initiated. “The Tacit” an elite military formation was born that day, but their history makes no  mention of their forming, and verbal account does not cumulate in a unit of mouthless men. 



41st Millenium

We are Legion (2008, the original story from Jade Vessel =I=munda campaign)

They needed to find him and find him they did. Didn’t feel that way now, did it. It was fething cold, the humidity of the earlier thunder rains was whisked around by the brisk sea wind flowing through the forgotten docklands. The full moon cast a pale, icy glare that froze the shadows of the stand off. 
There he was, in rugged civilian clothes, armed with a brace of pistols, Sgt. Jargassor, whom all needed to find - the least of their concerns now. 

The entire hunt team had their retinas transfixed on the massive being next to him. A dozen weapons of different make pointed at him for what little difference it made. Standing two and a half meters, a god of war, clad in a huge suit of armor the color of night, the giant stared back, immoveable like a statue, yet radiating explosiveness like an unstable flux core reactor. 

The wind turned only to punctuate the stalemate.

‘I am Alpharius, We are Legion‘ The giant announced in a distinctive, flowing, silky, yet authoritarian voice.



A Band of Brothers  (2009)

Rhisinne, great equatorial plains, 999.M41

Bone jarring grind engulfed the wadi, Wrath of Vulcan, a Storm Lord and two Baneblades: Steel Dancer and Equilibrium powered forward in triangle formation, followed by two companies of Leman Russ Vanquishers, tiny in comparison. The plain on both sides was a hell storm of fire and smoke, as the 2-2-1 Artillery blanketed the approach invisible. Forty-two Chimeras followed the main battle tanks into the wadi, carrying the 3-7 Renor Grenadiers.

In the huge border county hive, a squadron of Valkyrie screamed thorough perilous support beams and hab structures. On board squads of the Tacit sat in silence, meditating the battle plan. Each could feel the stream of data in their comm implants, as their rides banked from side to side to navigate the tight approach and avoid the intense flak. 

Sgt. Jurg of 3-7 double checked his watch, briefly revealing a hint of dark blue tattoo. A symbol bearing clear resemblance was also found on Colonel Rafs’ Chest, underneath the ballistic cloth that the Storm Lord crew wore to work. Comissar Grennel wore a signet ring with a snake around two crosses. Each and every one of the Tacit had a burn brand XX on their left pectoral muscle. Then there were the Stealth Cells, like Effrit, who wore much more developed and hidden brands.  All told, over a thousand man or women preparing for war, training and training were “Legion First”.



Rhisinne, Ultima Segementum  (following extract thought to be a current draft of Ordo Hereticus fact file: re: Rhisienne) (2009)

A bastion of Imperial might, Rhisinne, it’s twin guardian moons Vipera and Pythan and 3 satellite worlds Quntus (agri world), Renor (geo mineral world) and Falkh (Cardinal World) together form an empire  of indomitable attrition against the fury of Maelstorm and the countless Xeno foe in the eastern Fringe. The System is gaining respect and referenced with the Likes of Abdus Prima and Gelt, even Ultramar, in productivity and model of Imperial Creed. 

Rhisienne’s illustrious history draws close to the annals of the Heresy and it’s aftermath, but the founding of the mythical and elusive Blades of Laerna (Gene Seed unknown) chapter in M36 chartered an age of growth and strength in the region. In particular the pacification of Xenos hostilities in the region was profound. 

The Adeptus Terra allow for considerable leeway in the dealings of planetary governing bodies, when the tithes are met and regiments raised. Rhisienne has been exemplary on both accounts, but the behavior, and in particular refusal of the Blades of Laerna to fight together with other Chapters, has warranted two Inquisitorial investigations on their conduct and position of power within the system. No conclusive findings have been made, but nor has anyone been allowed on the twin moon bases of the chapter. Four different Inquisitorial Conclaves have argued the issue. The Chapter seems to have a veto of sorts within the inner chambers of Ordos Ultima Segementum.  Not so with the Astartes. Infuriated Captain Sicarius of the Ultramarines, normally the image of calm and tact, has reported his apparent disgust at a Blades of Lerna veteran, who outrageously introduced himself as _Heretic Name Scourged off records_, before disappearing without trace during recent operations against the upstart Tau Empire. This is but one of several shows of disrespect and bravado, or outright non co-operation. Some less taciturn chapters have threatened with open hostilities.

Rhisienne System can boast with two legendary Imperial Guard regiments, the Renor Grenadiers and the Elite Tacit. Furthermore the Rhisienne PDF is a top tier military formation, it’s Guard regiments in high demand across the sector and beyond. 

The system is a very model of Imperial values and strength, determined and resourceful. 



The VI Edition (2012)

A matrimony of flesh and engine, a one in a million mechanicum body for a uniquely gifted sentient gasped violently. Like a diver bursting from depths for that first animalistic inhale. The noosphere sifted, fluid, organic, but binary.  The sift caused a flurry of responses, the system sensing its new gift, feeling its tremendous potential. 

That gasp echoed in eternity. A thousand sinister and sadistic beings reacted with what would be best described as surprise. But that surprise was followed by feelings that would savage planets and devour populations. 

The test flight was a success. 

It was monitored by several cloaked Pegasus Surveillance kites, and other less impossible craft, all connected to the noosphere. The mechanical man in his ballistic grave trailing cables as thick as an Astartes thigh would have smiled had he not lost that ability aeons ago. 

That was not the only smile on the bridge of a massive displacement of nothing in high anchor over Ragoos. If someone had the means to reveal its nature and decipher its name, it was called Gamma, a hugely powerful subsystem. Two gigantic Astartes Captains shared a grin before addressing the others. It was quite the ensemble. So unorthodox and specialized that only the 20th Legion could muster and master such. 

When the God Emperor created his demigod generals and their Legions of super warriors he made them adaptable and all powerful, but he also designed each to perfect an aspect of warfare and to fulfill a unique role and character. The Imperial Fists would build his forts and surrender no ground,  led by Dorn genius of war architecture. Perturabo and his Iron Warriors would be his siege lords, assault destroyers without peer, able to crack open any defense. Leman Russ was the Emperor’s executioner. His loyal wolf pack that would hunt down everyone and anyone who needed to die.

When the Emperor had carefully considered all aspects of military strategy and tactics, theoretical and practical, he had one role left for insurance. The Rogue Agent, The XX. They would be the Emperor’s Special Operations Forces, full-filling the final gap in the perfect army. The most physically fit, independent, secretive, clandestine, unorthodox and creative of all of his Legions. 

What was set in motion in the Rhisienne system exemplified all of those qualities. The Emperor’s design was flawless. 



+++ 



It all started 20 years ago. A young kid found the mysterious world of 40k through Space Crusade and then 2nd Edition.

Playing the game with other kids my age, I was naturally the most able with technique, but one of the kids was really doing his own thing. While all the others were admiring the freehand flames on my Dark Angel Captain’s cape, I was in awe of these bright green, loosely painted marines mixing parts from RT era and other model kits and doing the unexpected. 

By the 3rd Edition, I had left and come back, and got hooked so I would not leave again. I also once more met a friend with ability to produce such genius originality that that it made me reconsider all of my own work.

Stupendous amounts of hard fun and work later - a fun Necromunda campaign with solemnly Inquisitorial twist changed things for me. We called it =I=munda.

During the campaign and reading the Legion book, I just had to try portraying GW art and Legion the book, in a single concept Marine. Painted for impact not technical perfection. Something I had been searching since the start of the hobby. I finally found the space where I like the work I produce and it resonates originality and freedom in my own possibly biased opinion. Despite the growing up business, the hobby remains an unrestricted canvas were I can just have fun, explore and enjoy, without the pressures and budgets of real world. 

What I remember very fondly from second edition was the mix and match of imperial allies. Marines and guard standing side by side. So the allies rules have obviously been the best news with the new edition. The first Leman Russ demolisher kit was just released when I got in the hobby, so that will also feature... But more importantly, the second edition has had a seminal role in inspiring this project.

Having first nailed the marine in a way that presents the legion character and the Astartes physique “correctly”, I was happy to find away with the humble Imperial Guardsman. A regiment that would typify some of the crazyness of 40k in comparison to modern military. The original plan for IG was to be:

  1. a mass canvas bringing out the marines and esoteric agents
  2. good on their own
  3. fit in with the existing palette
  4. not be too drab and sink in terrain totally like my previous guard.

The army is now at gaming strength, aiming for tournament strength, and after the latest forays to the gorgeous new Dark Vengeance boxed set, and the Dread Knight Venerable Dreadnought, the plan is simple. Find the stamina to do Guard in numbers, and ignite the forge world to produce tanks!

I do have one sincere ask for GW. A new plastic guard regiment or two, please. Those are looooong over due.

Stay tuned.