GENERAL: Decals

Okay, the first tick off my list.

• Wash my stripped models to get the Dettol off
• Write up more battle reports
• Paint Land Raider
• DONE - Put transfers on Terminators and Dreadnought
• Photograph my Blood Angels for Warseer
• Tidy my games room
• Read some more Imperial Armour 3 and/or Dark Apostle

I thought I'd stick the transfers on my models first so that they would have some time to dry before I photograph them this afternoon. So rather than show you quick photos now I'll post some proper army shots later on.

I've kept the transfers as low key as possible with the Terminators in particular only getting two each (their Blood Angels symbol and the Armageddon lightning flash). I plan to paint individual heraldry on each Terminator in the future so less is more for now.

GENERAL: Listing badly

I have a day off work today and a few hours to dedicate to gaming. There are myriad of things I could do so I made a list to keep me focused.

Here's what's on it:

• Wash my stripped models to get the Dettol off
• Write up more battle reports
• Paint Land Raider
• Put transfers on Terminators and Dreadnought
• Photograph my Blood Angels for Warseer
• Tidy my games room
• Read some more Imperial Armour 3 and/or Dark Apostle

The first thing I've done is publish the first full battle report from the Gauntlet 2004 tournament. You can read it here. It was hard to put together as I've mentioned earlier - it's hard to remember the details of a game you played 5 years ago! I hope it reads okay.

I plan to keep checking back in throughout the day to chart my progress with the other tasks.

GENERAL: Gauntlet tournament report

As well as my painting update I blogged yesterday I also blogged the introduction to the Gauntlet Tournament 2004 over on my battle reports blog.

This has been a while in the making as I lost all the text files detailing my games. I managed to find the army lists and opponents I played in an old notebook and much trawling through my photo back-up on my computer uncovered some photographs of the games.

So I'm slowly piecing together each game and I'll be posting them in the coming days as and when I finish them. Of course I have to fit that in around the building and painting of my Land Raider Crusader...

PAINTING AND MODELLING: Land Raider Crusader interior

I got an unexpected opportunity to have an afternoon off work on Monday so I came home and started painting. I wasn't really in the mood but I thought I'd try thirty minutes and get at least something done but once I started I didn't want to stop until the whole of the interior of the Crusader was finished.

As you can see, I did just that! I painted the interior in the same scheme as my other Blood Angels vehicles - white with brown shading. This provides a good contrast with the vibrant red of the exterior.

The only difference with this kit was that I used Devlan Mud rather than Brown Ink to shade the recesses. I painted all of the details too such as the seating, keypads and shrine.

My favourite part was the datascreens. I enjoyed painting all the green logic engine screens - very Aliens.

After I'd taken the photos I decided to glue what I had together and leave it overnight. Just for fun I thought I'd line it up alongside my finished Land Raider to see how it compared.

I now need to decide whether to put the Hurricane bolters on the front or back openings of the Crusader. Although I put the Godhammer lascannons on the rearmost mounts on my regular Land Raider, largely for aesthetic reasons, I'm currently thinking I might put the bolters on the front mounts. This will help to make each Raider visually distinct and might also help on the battlefield as it will give the guns an extra inch or two of range.

Anyone got any opinions?

NEWS AND RUMOURS: Planetstrike advance orders

Games Workshop have put up pretty much all of the Planetstrike buildings and terrain on advance order on their website.

You can check out decent photographs of the blastscape craters, shrine of the Aquila (which is now confirmed as a previously unseen building NOT the Dark Angel fortress), the resin mines, bombs and booby traps and the strongpoint, defence network and outpost combined sets. The hoped for trench board to add to the realm of battle gameboard never materialised and the it turns out that the outpost and defence network just come with the basic gameboard.

There are also some second wave Space Marine models in the shape of the Landspeeder Storm (which the Blood Angels can't get - boo!), Ironclad Dreadnought and two special characters - Vulkan He'stan and Kor'sarro Khan.

I'm eyeing up the Imperial strongpoint (with two bastions and three Aegis defence lines), the landing pad, the blastscape craters and the mines, bombs and booby traps which will pretty much fill up my planned trench table.

Bring on the 4th of July!

PAINTING: Start your engines!

I've begun the painting of my Land Raider Crusader. I know this will me a massive task, particularly as I've decided to fully paint the interior. I have undercoated it on the sprue which is a very unusual technique for me. The first part I chose to paint, to ease myself in more than anything, is the engine block.


It's a fairly straightforward scheme with silver pipework and brass fittings. I played around with some different washes on the metallics to give each set of pipes some variation; a bit of Gryphonne Sepia here, some Leviathan Purple there, a dash of Ogryn Flesh. It's subtle but took virtually no time to do so what's the harm? In fact the whole part only took about an hour and a half to completely finish.

So with the engine finished I can now move on to the rest of the interior.

NEWS AND RUMOURS: Gamesday Spain

Games Workshop have done it again!

Three weeks ago following Gamesday Baltimore I bemoaned the lack of news and rumours regarding the forthcoming Planetstrike expansion, as well as Planetary Empires and even the next codex. I was sure that something exciting would emerge from Gamesday Spain but apparently not...

Wolf's Bane on Warseer reported this:

Hi all folks!! I've been in GD Spain this morning. I've been in a presentation made by Robin Cruddace, the new Imperial Guard codex writer. In that presentation, he told about the new things in 40K / fantasy (even a Bloodbowl miniature new launch) until Agoust.

After the presentation, a man from the public ask him about Wolfs. He didn't wanted to say a word about the date launching but what he did tell, was they are working not only in Wolfs but in Blood Angels and Black Templars together other codexes. After the presentation, I asked him personally about the progress level of the Dark Eldar. It was in that moment when I begun to cry. He told me Jess didn't finish his work, so IF the push them into production right now, AT LEAST, they are a year far.

Before leveling up hopes, he didn't told me anything about the progress level or even a possible date on Blood Angels, Dark Templars, etc. I didn't asked him directlly, but he didn't mention anything about Grey Knights.

So, in a summary way ... he told about
1. Dark Eldar. At least one year from now. Probably more.
2. Bood Angels / Black Templar. In works right now.
3. Wolfs. Codex finished, send to some translators. (this one didn't told me him)
4. Necron and Tyranids in works.
5. Legion Codexes. They have talk about them, but with no result. Not on the planning.
6. Legend & Heraldry of Imperial Guard. Maybe if the new book for Imperium Legend & Heraldry has good acceptance.

I think I'm not forgotting anything. PD: I cry very much about my Dark Eldar / Grey Knights bad rumours.

The nugget of good news in there from my perspective is the unexpected possiblity of a new Blood Angels codex. I'd love to see my Marines get an update over their woeful PDF.

No photos of new models came out of Spain which has to be a first, I think. It's all the more surprising then that I got an e-mail from Games Workshop announcing the new Hellhound kit which is coming in August.

The kit includes three variants; the Hellhound, Bane Wolf and Devil Dog.

Although there have been some grumbles about the aesthetics I have to say that I'm a fan and will almost certainly be picking up a kit or three for my Guard armies at some point.

Hot on the heels of the Hellhound announcement pics of the Demolisher kit surfaced.

Both kits are fully plastic and will sell at £30.