Welcome to the second issue of On the Hobby Desk, where we try to branch out from just the perfect finished product, and show you more of the world of painting/building etc. We have a good mix today of painted, unpainted, and…uniquely painted. So let’s take a look.
Cadian Shock Troops (40k)
I’ve finally got round to painting my Cadians and six of ten are almost ready. I still need to apply finishing touches, but they are battlefield ready. The other four I may decide to apply a different paint scheme, maybe winter camo, but for now I’ll leave them.
After applying a white primer to the sprues, I built the models in stages, first adding the torso to the legs and adding the head to make painting easier. Once you’ve added the arms it can be more difficult to get into some of the detail. The main reason for me for buying these sets is to have a good selection of figures for Warhammer 40K RPG characters and since there is often an Imperial Guard character, these will offer a great choice to select from.
I used mostly Vallejo for the three main colours used, Goblin green for the armour, Bone white and Leather brown. I used Gunmetal for the weapons and Citadel’s Kislev flesh for the skin and Vallejo Orange fire for the promethium tanks for the flamer and Bloody red for a sergeant’s shoulder panel. I tried to keep to the standard Cadian colours although the clothing is a little lighter, essentially because I’m using the paints I already own.
For detail I used Citadel’s Agrax earthshade, with a little Reikland Fleshshade and Athonian camoshade. Then for highlights I used a little of the green with a bit of white to lighten it then touched up the edges and then added slight touches to flat areas across the miniatures to add a mottled, lived in look. To finish off, I simply added green paint to the base and added some grass flock.
Neil Parker
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Cadia Stands! These are the real power in the Imperium. Space marines get too much credit, it’s the Astra Militarum that give their lives every day. These are really nice Cadian’s with a solid classic Cadian’ colouring. We especially like the orange highlights, primarily on the flamer tank which just looks like it’s going to explode at any more. Very grim dark. We also love that you are using these models theWarhammer 40K RPG. All models have many uses, so it’s good to open your mind to the possibilities.
Rebel Alliance Starter Set (Star Wars Legion)
On a Hobby Desk Far, Far, Away – well Bognor actually – a legion of multi featured Star Wars miniatures have taken over my desk and life.
But let me explain.
The Force is Upgraded
At the end of October I wrote a news item about the new “Upgrade” to Star Wars Legion. I got myself so excited about it I immediately bought the new Rebel Alliance “Starter” set. With its excellent collection of 36 miniatures: 22 troopers, 7 commandos, 6 wookies and Mr. L. Skywalker himself.
Now I already have the original Star Wars Legion base game with its own Luke and his father Lord Vader plus troops from both sides (33 figures) as well as the two Hoth sets Echo Base defenders (37 figures) and Blizzard Force (27 figures) nearly a hundred in total including heavy weapons, chicken walkers, AT-ST and speeder bikes (Not to mention the clone wars set which I haven’t even opened yet!) and I’ve yet to have battle with them!
So why did I need the upgrade? Well apart from the fact I’m an inveterate collector I’ve just been playing Battle of Hoth from Days of Wonder with its quick action play style based on Memoir ’44 and I wanted to compare it to fighting Hoth with Star Wars Legion.
One Rule to Rule them All
I needed the new rule set to work with my existing forces but soon found out you don’t get a nice new printed rulebook in the box you have to download them, for free, but 73 pages long! This is where GW shines. They’re stated as “streamlined” but what they mean is they are properly defined.
Legions Assemble and Glue and Paint
I got everything out as in the pic and made a start. It turns out I’d built and undercoated the Hoth figs but nothing else. I’ve now primed the new figures and built some but am now in a quandary as their racial types and uniforms are not suited to Hoth. So do I build the new army or finally finish my Hoth forces. Watch this space.
Newbie Tips
Make sure you don’t use white paint instead of primer! Some spray cans have security rings to stop them accidentally going off and will not work however hard you try until you remove them. They should state this in larger letters!!
If you prime or paint before you construct, be careful that the glue doesn’t remove the paint.
Pete Bartlam
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All The Way Squad pack (Star Wars: Shatterpoint)
This month, I got a bit bothered by K2S0 glaring at me from my desk of shame, so I decided to tackle the All The Way Squad pack. Granted it’s a bit inconsistent timeline wise, because it’s TV Cassian and Vel and Rogue One Pathfinder Sgt and K2S0.
I don’t particularly rate the Cassian sculpt, which is not quite up to the standard of a lot of the releases. I do, however, like the Pathfinders, and that we get a Vel sculpt that’s spot on. I like the Sgt sculpt too, it’s dynamic and spot on… but I wish we had a Melshi (the guy who’s in jail with Cassian, ends up joining the rebellion, and is there on Scarif at the end).
As usual, it’s Vallejo paints and gw washes over colour forge grey primer. Let’s start with the bases, for a change! First, Generic base gravel to hide the urban elements. Then, Cork Brown followed by Khaki all over, then washed with earthshade. The water was blocked on turquoise and simply wet blended with wavy dabs of deck tan. Then, Valhallan Blizzard was dabbed on the shoreline and any gravel in the “water”, before the sand was drybrushed and a wee grass tuft added.
K2S0 gets a gun now! He is a fun sculpt. I decided to avoid using metals on him. Painted nato black (which is a very flat, VERY dark grey, drybrushed ghost grey, washed Nuln Oil, Averland Sunset for the trim and gloss white for the eyes. Lovely.
For the others, the cloth was Dark prussian blue for the jackets highlighted 50/50 with deck tan (obvs 😉 ), with Cork Brown for other brown sections and US WW2 green for the pathfinder trousers, washed with earthshade. Flat Flesh base for the pink skin, Dark wood for the brown. Cassian washed Sepia, Vel and Sergeant Fleshshade, and violet shading. Beastly brown for hair, and a new method on hers, with trans orange over that.
Sam de Smith
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Well that squad is certainly going all the way! We love how they look as a team, you’ve really tied them together. The bases especially should be mentioned as they are some of the best beach meets water bases we’ve seen. Takes them and us right back to Scarif…although let’s not think about that..
Fireflies (Konflikt 47)
There are two groups of people reading this. One group totally gets this and loves it. The other group, the younger group, are wondering why I’ve painted some soldiers green. Well I’ll tell you why.
Often when painting miniatures we get hung up on official paint schemes and what things ‘should’ look like. If you want to have an army of Imperial Fists, great, stick with their colours. If you want a custom paint scheme that still looks relatively normal. Also good. But consider other options. Models are simply canvases after all, we can paint whatever we like. So sometimes I like to get a bit quirky with my paint schemes. In the past you might have seen my ‘Bone crons’, or my Kroot painted like they are in the Sin City movies. Well my latest dose of quirkiness comes in the form of army men.
It’s the 1990s. GW is around but still growing and very much a niche thing spoken of in the more geeky corners of the world. What is a young kid to do? Army Men that’s what. We didn’t need fancy colours, stats or dice. We had green army men that we made go pew pew as they shot each other, making the fight as dramatic as possible and loving every second of it. They even appeared in films such as Toy Story, ready to help save the day.
When I look at these models I’m taken back to those times and it makes me smile. So in my book, they are doing their job well.
N.B It’s Warpstone Glow green paint over a Chaos Black spray if anyone is wondering. And I am very much looking forward to more of the new Konflikt 47 miniatures. They’ve done a really good job updating them.
Ross Coulbeck
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Wow. Those certainly take us back. Such a unique take on the hobby but something we’ll certainly keep in mind. There is only one more thing left to say.
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