kitbash – Twitchy Bristles

Merry Christmas from the Death Guard!

What could be more 2020 than finding Plague Marines of all things under the Christmas tree? When I started this batch I was going for an old Horus Heresy look but the longer I kept at it the more I felt like they were taking on a festive life of their own. I’m happy with how this batch turned out, though (in typical fashion) I tripped over the finish line and applied the varnish way too thick on the last couple steps and had to go back and fix a few resulting defects.

Pictured: You get an HQ, and you get an HQ, and look under your chair – it’s another HQ!

I wanted to post this to give a taste of what’s coming in 2021 for individual galleries – Death Guard, Death Guard, and lots of Death Guard, with battle reports and comparisons as well between what I’ve painted before and what I accomplished with this batch. All things considered I’m very happy with how they turned out and I’m very much looking forward to seeing how they do on the tabletop – and I’m very happy with my new Artel W proxy units, including a Sister Pestilencia model from kinpatsusamurai!

Pictured: Sister Pestilencia, who is…*definitely* the only Battle Sister I’ll own in the new year. Yup. Nothing to see here…

2020 has been…it’s been a year, alright. And while I think I weathered it okay, it leaves me in a pretty iffy space heading into the next year. My funding runs out at the end of this month, my Master’s is still incomplete, and I don’t have a stable job at the moment, but…all the same thankful for the friends, family, and all the other good things in my life. Here’s hoping that 2021 is a more gracious year than the one now past!

*We wish you all a Merry Christmas, and a very happy New Year!*

Eldar Fire Prism

A long time ago I saw Spikey Bits’ LED-lit Eldar Fire Prism and decided I was going to do that someday. Now, with more or less my whole Eldar army assembled, I decided this was going to be the time, and that this was going to be the model with which I call my Eldar “done.” Feeling like this army is done is bittersweet, but also a thrill – and I’m looking forward tremendously to running this Fire Prism with the rest of my space elves on the tabletop.

Pictured: The lighting on the Star Engines, which I must pay 10 points for in perpetuity.

Putting this together was definitely the trickiest build I’ve ever done. Having to drill holes into the frame of the model and run wires between the power supply in the base and to each of the model’s assemblies took planning, elbow grease, and a little luck, but when it came to rigging up the lights themselves Evan Designs and their LEDs were fantastic. Even without having worked with electronics at much length before I was able to figure it out, patch it together, and bring this boat to life.

Pictured: The bare Fire Prism without heavy weapons or canopies. Hello, pilots!

The final tank ended up being built in a number of subassemblies, either pressure fit or magnetized together so that I can fix it later if any of the lights shut down. I used a take on the “sponge” method I’ve used to do grav tank hulls before and that I used prominently on my Death Guard (and Spekd has my eternal gratitude for introducing me to that.) The hull design is a cross between the “eye” motif Ulthwe uses generally, but is also a callback to the game Fire Emblem: Awakening. Because I’m hot trash.

Pictured: My “Falcon”, like everything else in my army, geared to support Howling Banshees.

In addition to the color-changing rainbow cannon and the flickering engine lights, the Fire Prism is also multipurpose – for a while now, my existing Falcon has been in Biel-Tan colors and since I’m going full-Ulthwe I wanted my Howling Banshees to have a party bus that would fit in with the rest of my army. As KinpatsuSamurai has pointed out, I have picked a lane, and I’m owning that!

As tricky as the build was, and as much as I might have been able to give it more love if I’d waited until after my Masters’ was done, I’m extremely happy with the results on this. This is the best model that I have ever built and painted, and the difference between this and my older work (before Twitchy Bristles) is night and day. I don’t think I could hope to end the construction and painting of my Eldar army on a better note.

Preview: Taste the Rainbow Cannon!

This is a model I’ve poured a lot of effort into over the last month – originally I was going to build it after I finished writing my Masters’ research project as a reward, but then a local painting contest came up and I thought it would be a great chance to get some local exposure for my work. The contest is part of the Sci-Fi @ Home convention, based out of St. John’s. I’ll have a proper gallery done up soon, but in the meantime, here’s the video that I sent in as a demo of the lighting system!

Pictured: The lighting demo for my Eldar Fire Prism, in Craftworld Ulthwe colors.

(www.youtube.com/watch?v=67FDkVV4CgY if you can’t see the embed.)

Thrilled to get my name out there as a painter, and I’m excited to run this in my Eldar army soon! Full gallery on this coming next week!

It lives! Lighting test for my Fire Prism

Just a short, sweet update for today. I’m still hard at work on my thesis and won’t have the chance to do any major hobbying for a while. But I did have time to do this: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67FDkVV4CgY if you can’t access the embed)

Pictured: Left to right, the engine, prism cannon, and cockpit lights.

The lights and the battery pack and other accessories were all bought via https://evandesigns.com/, and they were relatively easy to put together (even for someone with no real knowledge of electronics, wiring, circuits, etc.) The shipping was relatively quick and to be honest I might pick up more lighting sets from them in the future if I light other 40K vehicles.

My plan is to use the blue lights for the engines, the four white lights for the two cockpits, and the color-changing LED to give my Fire Prism a bright, shiny rainbow cannon. There’s a local convention doing a miniature painting contest this month, so if I can work a little more efficiently on my thesis and free up some spare time this might be the right time to bring this to life.

Chaos Rhino (Kitbashed)

Pictured: A Very Useful Daemon Engine of Nurgle.

This one is a kitbash that came to me as soon as I started working on my first few Death Guard. I built my Eldar army to be very refined, serious, lore-heavy, and my best-foot-forward into the hobby, but with Death Guard I wanted to be able to give myself a little more wiggle room and have a little more fun. The result was this crime against nature. And I think this is some of the most fun with miniatures I’ve ever had.

*Thomas had never seen such bullsh*t before.*

Thomas is equipped with a Combi-Plasma and Combi-Bolter, and usually also equipped with a “Strolling Through Ultramar”-style saxophone marine for good measure. The weathered, grimy and textured-looking paint scheme was heavily inspired by Spekd at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLsaW52-xDnFL2WsLhe0bmQ, who I can’t recommend highly enough. He does awesome tutorials, reviews, and has built a great community.

*It was time for Thomas to leave. He had seen everything.*

Death Guard (Chaos Lord and Plague Marine Kitbashes)

Pictured, left to right: a Chaos Lord w/ Balesword and Power Fist, and two Plague Marines.

When I started getting back into 40k and painting I thought I was gonna go all in on an Eldar army and not really work on much else – but a local friend I play with had other ideas, and gifted me some Chaos Space Marine bits to play with. I was immediately hooked. The bits I was gifted turned into my first step into a tremendously fun, almost year-long painting project.

Pictured: A Plague Marine with a Plasma Gun on a Very Useful Engine ™.

A lot of the painting was done with sponge work – which was a new tool for me but I learned a lot by doing it, and ended up with some really interesting results. Drew a lot of painting inspiration from Spekd on Youtube (who is awesome, by the way – you can check out his community, reviews, and painting tutorials at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLsaW52-xDnFL2WsLhe0bmQ)!

The Heretic Astartes, also known as Chaos Space Marines, are fearsome foes. They have a Space Marine’s abilities, along with his gear of war, but since turning to the darker powers many also now bear powerful mutations or gifts from their patron Chaos Gods, making them mightier still.

Spiritseer Caen’thala

A Spiritseer as a Warlord? Heresy! In all seriousness, I didn’t want to make Eldrad Ulthran my Warlord because he can’t take relics or other nifty warlord abilities in 8th, so I decided that I was going to give the job to a Spiritseer! Caen’thala is the new 8th Edition sculpt kitbashed together with some Age of Sigmar bits to give her a little more character and personality.

Pictured are all my recent Ulthwe characters together in one place. In matching outfits!

Caen’thala is equipped with Kurnous’ Bow instead of a Shuriken pistol, and also has the Seer of the Shifting Vector ability to make her a little more Perils-proof. Her preferred psychic powers are Protect/Jinx or Enhance/Drain, and to paraphrase/quote The Emperor TTS series, she longs for genestealer ass.

Spiritseers are those upon the Witch Path who are called to commune with the dead – a chilling concept, even amongst the Asuryani. Though Spiritseers help to ensure the survival of the entire Aeldari race, their actions are perceived by those around them as akin to necromancy; yet another depth the craftworlds must sink to in their struggle to stave off a lingering demise.

Objective Markers

Jain Zar turned slowly, seeing row after row of cadaverous faces leering down at her from the stands – a crowd of the deceased, some little more than dead skin on skeletons, others with split skulls, gashed faces, slit throats, pierced breastbones and savaged ribcages. Her opponents. Her victims.

Since Howling Banshees were a big chunk of my Eldar work over the last while, I decided I wanted to have some nifty new objective markers done up for them – and this also gave me something to do with some old, 1-2 ed. Banshees that I wasn’t sure I’d ever get around to!

Pictured are markers one, two, and three, distinguished by the number of minis on them. I’m so clever sometimes.

I also used a miniature I got free a while back because they looked ancient and elven and fit the rest of the aesthetic here enough – and because thematically it fits with my army, since my Spiritseer wields Kurnous’ Bow instead of a regular shuriken pistol. These were super easy and quick to do, because Nihilakh Oxide is magical stuff.

Dire Avengers

Devotees of Asuryan himself, those who walk the path of the Dire Avenger become adept at both attack and defence. Their exarchs are masters of a swift and flexible warrior-stance that capitalises on everything it means to be Asuryani.

Dire Avengers were a change of pace for me! Up to this point my only Troops units for Eldar have been Guardians or Rangers, but when a friend gifted me a box of them last year I was thrilled to be able to work on them, and to add them to my regular Eldar lists.

Pictured is yet another Fire Emblem reference – the fam’s all here!

Most of these were just done straight from the box but I did a little kitbashing with a couple of them to make homages to Fire Emblem characters, since the friend who got me to the box is a huge Fire Emblem fan. I’m very happy in the end with how they turned out, kitbashes and all, and I’m excited to see how they do on the tabletop.

Dire Avengers take to the field armed with Avenger Shuriken Catapults. These elegant weapons are even more advanced than the Shuriken Catapults used by the craftworld Guardians. Their lethal volleys echo the Death of a Thousand Blades, the punishment that Khaine metes out upon traitors and cheats who are unworthy of a clean kill.

Wraithlord “Big Sister”

“Big Sister,” pictured equipped with two Shuriken Cannons and her trusty Banshee mask.

A couple Christmases ago, a local friend I play 40k with gave me a few old metal models to rescue/repair, and I couldn’t have been happier to take this on. This model is probably held together with more green stuff, putty, and glue than actual metal, but she’s all done and magnetized and ready for the tabletop. Had the chance to go back recently and give her a couple touch-ups before picture day, too.

“Big Sister” and all of her little sisters, pictured about to ruin somebody’s day.

Towering over her former squadmates and equipped with a pair of Shuriken Cannons, a Shuriken Catapult, and a Flamer, I imagine Big Sister having been a Howling Banshee in life who’s been called back by the Infinity Circuit to stand with her sisters even in death.

I know it’s objectively goofier than the sleek new 4th ed. one, but I love the design of the old wraithlords and I’m really happy with how she turned out – especially with the addition of a few Craftworlds and Age of Sigmar bits for flavor.