Today I Built A Zombie Chihuahua

It's becoming a bad habit, my blog tardiness. Apologies.

This time's excuse is pretty much just that I haven't focused on anything for weeks so have nothing to report!

I've started building axles for the Taurox conversions I'm working on so I'll report back on how they come out soon but, in brief, they're a huge pain.

I also bought the Malifaux McMourning box for some fun and because the models are amazing! Except for one...

The zombie chihuahua is small. Really small. Too small?

At what point does someone look at CAD designer's mock up and say "woah woah, people can't actually handle those pieces mate" or "hang on, aren't those legs too tiny to actually glue to anything that'll let it support itself?". See the photo's if you need an idea.

It's silly small. Yes they're packed with detail but its so small I'm yet to see a painted version that makes very good use of it all! It's a shame but I guess I'll see how I get on with it once it's based and the paint flows.

Sorry again for the big wait and then this substantial lack of content! I'll have a word with myself and get back to something useful!

Taurox 8 Wheeler WiP

I promised myself Eldar were next. I'd finish the Dark Angels, sell the Grey Knights and redo all my old, beloved 'Dar.

Then GW took it upon themselves to release the Knight Titan and I had to have one. That was the quickest I've ever bought-built-painted something to finish ever. I love it, I'll be getting another. But now onto Eldar...

Then GW took it upon themselves to release Scions and the Militarum Tempestus. I would resist. No more distractions from my one true love of 40K. Eldar time!

THEN my friend gave me some Scions because I spent he whole of the Friday at Throne of Skulls helping him paint his Tau. Bugger. Now I had Scions I might as well have a Taurox right? Right??

Imperial Knight - WiP

Throne of Skulls is on Friday and the objective is to have this guy up to scratch of at least reasonable table top quality. Here's where I'm at from two evenings paint...

The pic with the Deathwing is the one with the leg armour in the right places.

Doesn't look massively different to the previous 'in pieces' shot I posted but that trim took a good while. Also done washes, silvers etc. Two evenings to go!

Painting: 48hrs To Go Until ToS Time

Toward the end of last week I posted with plans of an action packed few days over the weekend getting stared painting my Dark Angels ready for Throne of Skulls a little over a week away. I also promised updates.

Unfortunately for the painting a friend came to stay for the weekend at short notice...nothing like being two days behind before you even start!

I got some done today so here's how it's going...

Painting: Dark Angels ('Dualwing')

It's been a few weeks since my last post because I've been putting off the inevitable: PAINTING.

Goddammit though, I have to bite the bullet sometime.

That sometime is now. A week on Friday a few friends and I head to the GW November Throne of Skulls at Warhammer World. Last time I was there I ad a pretty sucky timebecause my 5th ed Angels Sanguine got trounced. Repeatedly. No fun. 

To mend that I'm taking an army I don't really know, it's really my play style and that I've barely practiced with. On top of that it needs painting. I essentially have five full days. (away with work, travel etc) so it's going to be a challenge for sure. Here's where things are at...

From The Chopping Board - Darkshroud Progress

I've been adding little bits and bobs to the bikers this week and finishing off the last few riders. It's not the most exciting for photo's so I'll show them when it's time to paint.

Yesterday I went back to working on the Darkshroud. I'd started working on it a few weeks ago and then put it to one side as I couldn't decide quite what to do with it.

Whole bunch of pictures after the jump...

Ravenwing Building Progress

My work bench has been in full production mode this last week or so.

Stacks of sprues. Two trays (and a frisbee) full of various bits and parts. Bikes pulled apart by hand. Thumbs sliced apart by knife.

You get the idea.

I came to a point of indecision with the Darkshroud - I think I'm going to entirely rebuild the front turret as part of the body. I put it to one side so I can come back to it after sourcing some parts and having thought about it a lot.

In the mean time I've been doing all the tedious jobs involved with this hobby - scraping flash lines and drilling bolter barrels (two different diameter drills per barrel). You know the stuff.

Today I started on the Command Squad which will be five men with the grenade launcher and banner option built as well making 6 total. You can see where I'm up to in the top picture. Aside from that I've added a few slightly different riders to break up the standard rather static pose. Here's a couple of them for now:

This Sgt is a super simple bit swap with a head from the Drakshroud and a Grey Knight hand. I also doubled up his wing banner things on the bike to bring it in line with the Dark Vengeance Sgt.

This guy is using one of the very old Dark Angel upgrade pieces (I think from early-ish 3rd edition?).

This chap is the rider from the Heresy era jetbike which I converted into Sammael (see last post). He didn't fit the bike too well so he needed leaning right forward to reach the handlebars and is pinned at each joint.

Lastly here's one of two attack bikes. This is the old metal-plastic hybrid model and I lost the gunner and used the melta for the old converted Stormraven. The old version like this had the gun on the stand rather than the rail so I could have built it all but decided to have a little fun instead. 

Initially the gunner was going to be stepping from the sidecar but it looked like he's kneeling. Not cool. So then I thought 'why would he be not staying sat down?' well if his driver is dead leaving him a sitting duck of course.

So I killed the rider. 

Open hand from the Sang Guard kit, straight bolt pistol arm, drill holes. Job done. His other hand has been blown off but still dangles from the handlebar! I showed a few friends this on Facebook and they said I had to play it as single wound, no +1 toughness (as he's off the bike) and either no move or always difficult terrain. I said 'hahaha, no'. 

I'll be making a downed biker for one of the other squad too. I also have a couple of (hopefully) cool flamer conversions on their way too. Pics of all that soon.

See you all soon!

Dark Angels Mk.II - Ravenwing & A Little Deathwing

Table top::most of new army
Table below: so many more bits to add!

Hi All,

I'm finally getting back into the hobby swing of things here at the Grotto. After my 'quick' Deathwing project ground to a halt over the last couple of months I've finally had another couple of games.

Getting the dice back rolling is always a good boost to anything gathering dust on the work bench.

With a mixed bag of results under my belt from the Deathwing I'd built up it's time to take a step back and see what I can change with plenty of time before ToS rolls round in November.  

The gist of it is - add more bikes!

After the break check out where I'm at with a few conversions and general plans...

Painting: Deathwing

In the two or so years I've been blogging away here on the big old internet, and across the 90-ish posts I've thrown out there, there has been ONE completed model shown on these colourless pages!

It's time for a change dear reader!

Even the picture to the left, designed to be my 'painting article' header is out of date - I've recently started using a wet pallette (how did I used to cope without one??? If you keep thinking about doing one, DO IT) and recently have been getting some practice in with my airbrush.

Anyway, onto todays project: getting the Dark Angels coloured in...

From The Chopping Broard - Cataphractii Deathwing Knights

Hey folks.

I'm keeping this brief today as I really, really need to go eat, but I know I won't have chance to post after food tonight or over the Easter weekend.

So, we went to Throne of Skulls. I got my arse kicked 4 out of 5 games. Kinda expected. Two losses were close (the kind I'd have won if the game hadn't ended on turn 5), two I got tabled. One I won. I had a good weekend but I'll leave it there before I start complaining to make myself feel better!

While there I (of course) bought some stuff I really didn't need from Forgeworld - Cataphractii Terminators and a Scimitar Jetbike:

The Scimitar is destined to become my own version of Samael, I have quite a bit of work planned for that model, though it'l be well after I start painting the Deathwing.

As for the fancy Terminators they're in the process of becoming my Deathwing Knights. I've not done much in the way of WiP but will do a post on how I built them another time. For now, just a quick blu-tac mock up will have to do for you. I'm THAT hungry!

Hope you like the look of them, more to come after the weekend hopefully. Happy Easter :)

Left Handed Frag Cannon

I know, I know - not the promised painting progress. Instead of painting one thing a day I'm doing bits of everything all at once so there's not yet much to show.

What I have done inbetween layers drying/whilst watching the first Grand Prix of the season is fit my Furioso with a Frag Cannon.

His unipue pose required it to be on the wrong side though - here's how I made it work...

From The Chopping Board - Articulating a Dreadnought: Build Finished

Two posts below this, there's the first half of this article, so go read that first if you like (and haven't already).

Done that? Right, let's crack on...

From The Chopping Board - Articulating a Dreadnought Part 1

Hey folks.

Regular service of chopping up things and making them a little different resumes! I've been a bit 'meh' about all my projects recently, having stared a cool Ork conversion (but not bothered to finish), purchased and built and Eldar War Wlaker (but not bothered to paint) and dabbled with a couple of small, insignificant projects. None have held my attention for more than a couple of days.

Then, last week, I played a 1,500pt game vs my friends new GK army. All went well (I won 14-1) but I took two Dread's, one being my old metal Furioso. The thing weighed a ton! It didn't come apart to fit in my army bag! It looks dated!

Something had to be done...

Vendetta: Paint Progress

A very quick, very brief post tonight to quickly show where I'm up to with the Vendetta painting.

I'm trying a couple of new (to me) colours on this, also getting some practice in on the airbrush - still a lot to learn there!

Without further ado:

I posted this last night from my phone so added a 'proper' picture now. I also wasn't initially too keen on the paint scheme as it'd come out but, after sleeping on it and being at work all day, I'm actually pretty happy how it's ended up looking.

More progress over the weekend :)

From The Chopping Board - Easy Vendetta Conversion

It's been a while since I did one of the ever popular From The Chopping board posts.

Along with two friends I'm heading back to Throne of Skulls at Warhammer World next month. Imperial Guard allies are along for the ride with the Angels Sanguine with a Vendetta included in their number.

I've been busy digging out all my old metal Guard guys, it'll probably be the next post later in the week as I start to strip and re-paint them. For now, here's a nice, simple way of getting a cool looking (I think) Vendetta.

Road to ToS

Hi all once again. Welcome back to the Grotto for a (rare) post about the direction of the Angels Sanguine army from a gaming perspective.

I'm heading the Throne of Skulls with three friends at the end of April and want to have the A.S 100% finished for it. This means; No airbrush experiments, no building Grey Knight henchmen, no playing Grey Knights, no fiddling with more Dark Eldar.

FOCUS!

Go ahead and click for the army list and jobs list...

From The Chopping Board - Scavenged Devastators

Heading to Throne of Skulls in April has made me think a bit about my force selection as, in recent months, there ain't be too much winning going on!

The Scout snipers I run serve little purpose in games apart from sitting round the back of the table and holding an objective before they die relatively easily.

I decided to fit in some (hopefully) more effective ranged shooting and, at the same time, increase my anti-tank ability - both of which I'm currently lacking in my list. The cheapest way to do this was with missile launcher armed Devastators. The cheapest way to afford them however was not to have to buy the launchers, which go for anything between £4 and £8 each. Here's the results of a very successful bits box raid last week...

From The Chopping Board - True/Art Scale Marine Update

Hi All,

My hernia operation last week has really hit me for six. I thought it'd be a pretty simple recovery but I honestly feel like I've been stabbed in the stomach (semi-technically the case). Therefore progress is slow as I can't sit on my stool at my workbench. Never-the-less, here's an update on Big Boi Marine™.

From The Chopping Board - True/Art Scale Marine

Yesterday I posted my month of Hobby Limbo and included a shot of a few components for a True Scale/Art Scale (anyone know the difference?) Marine.

Click on to read more with some better detail shots...

Jan & Feb - Hobby Limbo

We're already in February, January whizzed by yet I've been so busy NYE seems so long ago!

My new job has kept me pretty busy since Christmas so I've been the model equivalent of Jack of all trades, master of none.

The morbid picture above there is from the game Limbo, it's the best I could do to tie it in with the title!

Anyway, as ever, after the break there's plenty of catch up pictures of the bit and bobs I've been up to.