PAINTING: Two more planes roll out of the hangar

With two hours spare on Wednesday night I knuckled down and painted some more Ork planes.

I finished two fighta-bommers. One is armed with Grot bombs, so I also painted up both of my flying Grot bombs.


I used the same techniques on these planes as described in my earlier posts. The first fighta-bommer I decided to go for a big and bold flame effect on the wings and tail. As a result I decided to name this plane Flames of Waaagh.

I was running out of variations of checks, dags and flames by now so I painted solid markings on the wingtips and spine of my last fighta-bommer. The checks on the wings of the Grot bombs are molded on and the model is so tiny there was no space for anything else.

So I have now painted everything in my Ork Air Waaagh except the big Bommer. This will take a good couple of hours on it's own, if not longer, due to the size of the model. I expect to get this done today as I have a day off work.

If I'm feeling really inspired I might push on and start some more Imperial Navy models.

NEW MODEL FUND: Target acquired!

Just over a week ago I listed some of my unwanted models on eBay. The auctions included the Imperial Guard special character Captain Al'rahem, a Tanith Command squad including Corbec, Dorden, Milo, Larkin, and a plasma gunner, a limited edition Inquisitor Gideon Lorr model and a fully painted Goblin Blood Bowl Team including Ripper Bolgrot and three secret weapons.

I hoped these models would pull in about £50. In the event I almost doubled that and received £94.90. Since I won't be buying any more models this year, that means I have now exceeded my revised target of £750 in the New Model Fund by the end of the year!

Flushed with success I decided to immediately list some more models on eBay. I blogged about those auctions on Monday and when they finish on Sunday they will also contribute to my fund this year. I'll then have decided whether I can be bothered to list even more models before Christmas.

I can't wait until 2010 when I'll start spending all this cash!

SELLING: Greenskins

Hot on the heels of my previous auctions, I have another batch of models up for sale.

Most of the new models are 40k Orks. As I go through my collection of Ork models I am deciding which ones to keep and which ones to sell. Although there are a lot to build and paint there are also a lot I want to sell, mostly the older models.

First up though, is the current Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka model fully painted. It might seem strange that I'm selling this given that I'm about to start an Ork army but I fear his existing colour scheme won't fit into my new scheme. I also have a second unpainted version which I'm going to keep.

The rest of the Ork models are old school models from the Gorkamorka period. There is a Trukk, painted to a tabletop standard.


A Wartrakk with twin-linked big shoota.


And everyone's favourite: Warbikers.

Last, but definitely not least, we have a couple of lovely Goblin cheerleaders.

I'm hoping my two batches of eBay sales will take me to that magic £750 target.

PAINTING: Red ones go fasta!

Another day, another plane painted.

I'm really getting into my stride with my Ork Air Waaagh now. This plane, which I have christened Jagged Deff, only took an hour to paint.

That's all of the fightas finished now, so I have two fighta-bommers, a bommer and two grot bombs left to paint. If I keep up at this pace I should be finished my Ork squadron by the weekend.

PAINTING: AI Ork reinforcements

I had a couple of spare hours last night and although I really couldn't be bothered I forced myself to my painting desk to work on my Aeronautica Imperialis models. Given my mood I decided it would be best to paint my Ork planes - if I made a mess of them I could get away with it more easily!

Just like exercising, I found I enjoyed myself once I got started. Just two hours later I had two finished planes. Result!

I painted up one fighta and one fighta-bommer. I hoped that painting two different models would stave off boredom and keep me at the painting station.

I decided to take some close-ups of the models. I'm not sure I'm doing myself any favours by showing them at this level of detail!

You can see in both photographs above another problem I've had with my Ork models in particular. The big shootas in the wings are so fragile that many of them have snapped off. I considered replacing them with some brass rod but the wings are so thin I'm not sure I'll be able to drill a hole to stick it in. I think I'll wait until I've painted all the planes before I make my decision.

OPINION: Ideas to shake up your 40k games

Back in 2008 I was feeling a bit jaded with 40k and gaming in general. Gary, my regular opponent, and I had gotten into the routine of playing 1500 point games with missions straight from the rulebook week after week. In order to try and spice things up a bit I came up with a few ideas for unusual games.

As it happens we never did actually play any of these games but that shouldn't stop you from trying them out. Perfectly balanced tournament scenarios aren't the only way to play the game!

Tank battle
For a long time I preferred to paint and model infantry rather than vehicles but I then went through a phase of mechanising my armies, adding tanks and transports to them all. Gary was always more pragmatic and included vehicles in many of his armies. Between us we had about ten different factions with three to four vehicles each. So I got to thinking - wouldn't it be great if I could use all of those vehicles, across all the different factions, in one big game?

My plan was to put together the biggest table we could find, maybe even use the floor, and fight a gigantic tank battle. We would split the armies into the forces of order and disorder and then have at it. Points values be damned!

Any vehicles, including Dreadnoughts and walkers, could be used and no other models. We would play until one side had no mobile vehicles.

Seven Samurai
I think there is a scenario similar to this in the 6th edition Warhammer Fantasy battle rulebook. One person picks his 1500 point army as normal, without using too many vehicles, special characters or too many funky rules. The other person must spend his entire 1500 points on up to seven HQ choices. The 'normal' army has to wipe out the seven samurai by the end of the game otherwise they lose.

This game would probably be very quick to play, so you play two games in one night, with each player coming up with their own version of the seven samurai.

Arena of Death
Gary and I have large model collections including numerous special characters, greater daemons and sundry HQ choices. My idea was to gather them all together and plonk them on the table together. Each player rolls a die with the winner picking a character to activate. They get a full turn to move, shoot and assault with that character and then the other player chooses a different model. The players alternate characters until every model has had a turn and then the players dice off again.

The last model standing is the winner. That should help answer those annoying questions such as 'who is harder, Abaddon or Ghazghkull?' At least for a while.

40k League
My last idea was based on our Blood Bowl leagues. We would write up 500 point fixed lists for each of our armies - probably around 10 or so factions. These would be kept the same for the duration of the league. Each army would play every one of the others once. That would mean playing a lot of games! Now you understand why the armies are kept at just 500 points. Small games means you could play four games a night if you wanted to.

Each army would get 3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw and 0 points for a loss. Whichever army had the most points at the end of the league is the winner.

Anyway, that's all for now. This already feels like one of those rambling Standard Bearer articles by Jervis Johnson so I'll shut up.

GENERAL: Just sayin'

A few days ago I posted up my first Aeronautica Imperialis battle report.

What I really wanted to do was familiarise myself with the game rules, but rather than dryly run through them I decided to actually play through a game. I came up with some basic solo rules with half of my painted forces; two Thunderbolts versus three Fightas.

Check it out on my battle reports blog here.