Dark Vengeance Dark Angel painting tutorials part 1

Disclaimer - apologies for the poor camera lighting and photography in advance. 

Hi folks,

This is part one of a three part painting tutorial I will be adding to the site in order to celebrate the release of Dark Vengeance. Not only will this allow me to show some of the techniques I will be using on my Dark Angels over the next few months, but also hopefully will be of help to anyone who has the boxed set or who may be thinking of starting Dark Angels when they get a new codex, hopefully soon.   

Part one will focus on the rank and file Dark Angel tactical marine and will demonstrate how I paint armour and also plasma weapons. Part two, which will hopefully be up by the weekend, focuses on painting the ravenwing and also robes. Part three, again hopefully up over the weekend, focuses on the Deathwing and painting swords/green robes. I will state the colours used and include the new paint range equivalent in parentheses should I use older paints at any point. As I’m going to paint them from scratch in one sitting I will also give an estimate of how long they took to paint. These tutorials are simply my take on things and are by no means the best way to paint them. Hopefully they will be of some help to people though. Without further ado, on to part one:

1.       Undercoat: black spray. (always best to give it a lookover first and touch up any missed areas)

2.       Base coat: caliban green. Don’t worry about messing up other areas such as the gun as these will be more than covered later.

3.       Layer: Dark Angels green (I prefer the more vibrant green to that of caliban green. As it is no longer available you could get a similar colour by adding warpstone glow to caliban green or just ignore this step entirely)

4.       Highlight: Snot green (Warpstone glow) I try to catch all the edges with the brush turned at 45 degrees to the model. Where this is not possible I make a best guess. Don’t be afraid to make a bit of a mess then clean up with the previous colour after. This is especially handy with highlighting both inner and outer edges of shoulder trim. These highlights can be a bit tedious so you may want to have multiple models at different stages on the go at once for a bit of variety.

5.       Final highlight: Scorpion green (moot green) For this step I try to keep things simple and just go for some of the sharper edges on the armour (shoulder trim 90 degree angle, top of elbow pad) and higher areas such as the top of the backpack right knee pad and the helmet.

6.       Metal areas: leadbelcher Now that the majority of the model is covered, we can move onto the next most prominent area which is the metal areas. I usually paint the gun casing and ammo sickle, soles of boots, pipework, backpack vents, helmet grilles/ears etc, but not all of these are necessary.

7.       Belt and pouches: scorched brown (rhinox hide). Again, some prefer to keep these the same colour as the armour but I opt to paint them and the base of the model scorched brown. 

 

8.       Wash: nuln oil. Now that all this is finished your model should look almost there. At this stage I give them a wash of slightly thinned nuln oil all over. This adds depth to the brown and metal areas and helps to tie together all the green shades, as well as dulling them down a bit to leave a grittier finish. Leave this to dry for a while (maybe paint another in the meantime) before continuing.

 

Note - the black wash at this stage will dull the highlights and armour on the whole. If you do not wish for this then either apply a green wash/glaze instead or apply the highlights after the wash, though they will not be tied together to the armour as well.

 9.       Black areas: abaddon black. Once everything has dried I quickly touch up any of the black areas, such as the underarmour, left kneepad (in the case of 5^th company)

10.   Red detailing: mephiston red. There are several red areas on the model, namely the eyes, weapon, purity seal wax and, in my case, a band across the left knee for the 5^th company. I give them all a couple of coats to ensure a nice finish, being careful not to touch any areas that have been finished. No big deal if it happens. In fact, if any little mistakes do occur it’s often best to leave them til the end and have a general tidy just before completing the model. 

11.   Red highlight: squig orange. A light band on the edges of the weapon and in the medial nasal part of the eye. 

12.   Red shading: Baal red (carroburg crimson) Just give a light wash over the areas being careful not to touch any of the surrounding areas to blend the colours and give depth.

 13.   White chapter symbol: There are two ways to do this. Either several coats of ceramite white (up to 4) and a few thin lines of adminstratum grey to serve as shading, or a couple of coats of administratum grey with a couple of coats of ceramite white atop it. Both look the same in the end so it’s up to you for this one. While I have the white out I usually just put a couple of dots on the eyes for reflected light and write a few lines of inscription on the armour.  

 14.   Gold detailing base: balthasar gold. Any gold detailing I basecoat first in balthasar gold.

15.   Gold detaling wash: agrax earthshade

16.   Gold detaling final coat: auric armour gold

 17.   Purity seal and chest eagle base: rakarth flesh. Give both a coat or two to establish a nice base

18.   Purity seal and chest eagle layer: ushabti bone. I often don’t bother with this for the seal, just the eagle.

19.   Purity seal and chest eagle wash: seraphim sepia. May require two coats.

20.   Purity seal and chest eagle highlight: ushabti bone (optional)

  

21.   Plasma base: ice blue (lothern blue). A couple of coats of this gives you a good base.

22.   Plasma wash: I wash with a dilute form of the old inks but either the new blue shade or wash should do.

23.   Plasma highlight: ice blue (lothern blue) – mix with white and work up to lighter areas such as corners.

24.   Finishing touches for pouches: mournfang brown highlights

25.   Finishing touches for purity seals: abaddon black scripture

26.    Finishing touches for metal: runefang steel highlight on edges

27.   Base as required then spray varnish

Well there we have it, all done. It may seem like a long tutorial but at the end of the day, several of those steps are washes which take a few second to do whereas others focus on very small areas and thus take no time at all to do if you’ve a steady hand. For me, the area that is longest and most tedious is highlighting the armour. All in all though, not including drying time for spray/washes and photography, this little chap took me less than an hour to do. If you were after a more basic level you could leave out several steps such as pouches, company symbol, metal detailing and armour highlights to speed up the process.

I would greatly appreciate any feedback on the content/format of the tutorial as this is my first one and I can make changes to the next ones where needed based on that. Thanks for reading.

Vengeance is here!

Greetings folks,

Between holidays and hectic schedules it's been a while since my last post but finally I've been able to spend a few hours hobbying. 

A few big changes have happened since my last post. Firstly, with Blog Wars falling very close to exams now I've sadly decided not to attend. This is both a blessing and a curse as although I got about halfway with the Whitescars project I was getting really sick of painting white, to the point where it was no longer enjoyable. Secondly, as most of you will know, there's this little matter of Dark Vengeance being released.

The wife was kind enough to buy me a copy for my birthday and I also bought a second set as they were 20% off in my local store. Good tip here, buy a set and sell off some of the bits you don't need. I sold the hellbrute, chaplain and rulebook from my second set and it almost covered the cost of the entire set!!! I am most of the way through assembling the first set and am saving the second one for conversion projects when we see exactly what will be released for Chaos/DAs in the coming months. (or month depending which rumours you believe) 

Although I have two nightmarish medical placements before exams in early December, I have set myself the goals of focussing on both DAs and Chaos up till Christmas. Makes sense really given the starter set contents and upcoming releases. Although my Chaos forces purely consist of DV models, my DA army was already established as a deathwing/ravenwing/veteran army with a couple of land raiders/dreadnoughts thrown in. I've indicentally near doubled my ravenwing/deathwing forces and added a couple of tactical squads and HQs into the equation, but here's a sample of the original army schemes.

Deathwing:

White undercoat, ushabti bone, seraphim sepia wash, ushabti bone higlight, skull white highlight.

Veterans:

Black undercoat, caliban green, dark angels green, snot green highlight, scorpion green highlight, nuln oil wash. Robes are more complex but involve painting on the mixtures of dheneb stone/brown base before tying it all together with a seraphim sepia wash. (note absence of weapons as they're magnetised)

Ravenwing:

Black undercoat, dawnstone highlight.

I have a lot of models halfway finished for the army so hopefully should be able to post more in the next month along with some new additions from DV.

Whitescars painting progress so far

Very quick update and I'll let the pics speak for themselves. Have 11 out of 51 models done so far, some awaiting transfers and all awaiting varnishing but now that BW4 has been pushed back a few weeks looks like I'm still on target to get them all finished. Comments and crits welcomed.

Fixing Codex Space Marines

Hi all,

I was thinking about this yesterday when picking army lists. Much as I love the Space Marine Codex there's no denying that it lacks a certain something compared to it's more recent bretheren. However, As opposed to a complete rethink I'm more of the opinion that a bit of tweaking here and there would be more than sufficient to bring it up to speed (and up to date). Here's a unit-by-unit analysis of what I think:

HQ:

Special characters - as for now except with an Iron hands character added in. Each chapter specific model may take their own chapter tactics at no extra cost.
Chapter Master - add more exotic wargear options to differentiate from captain.
Honour guard - add the options for combat/storm shields 
Captain - same as now
Command Squad - include the option for jump packs 
Librarian - add in a new set of 6 (7) SM librarian powers as some are repeated in the new generic powers.
Chaplain - no changes needed
MoTF - add in more archeotech wargear


Chapter tactics:

Add in a space marine specific chart for chapter tactics (a similar chart as for warlord traits, but that works in addition to). These come specified for special characters from the appropriate codex. If a generic character is taken, they may choose to roll on the table (no cost) or may select a specific chapter tactic for a cost specified:

1 - Ultramarines - combat tactics (free)
2 - Imperial Fists - stubborn
3 - Raven Guard - fleet?
4 - Iron Hands - army gains a toughness bonus?
5 - Salamanders - twin linked flamers/meltas?
6 - Whitescars - outflank?
 
Troops:

Tactical squad - as now, but with more sergeant options and can take special weapon with 5 min models not 10.
Scouts - as now, but add in land speeder storm as dedicated transport


Dedicated transports:

Rhino - no change
Razorback - make heavy flamer free swapout for TLHBs
Drop pod - now only 10-man capacity
Land speeder storm - now a DT


Elites:

Apothecaries - make available in same way as sanguinary priests except only affects squad, not area affect. (models 40pts basic)
Terminators - add in combi weapon options for sergeant
Assault terminators - makeTH/SS a 5pt upgrade per model.
Dreadnought - same
Venerable dreadnought - same
Ironclad dreadnought - same
Sternguard - same
Legion of the damned -
Techmarine - either as now or as an option that doesn't take up a slot (same as SW codex)

Fast attack:

Bike squad - as now
Attack bike squad - as now
Land speeder - as now
Stormtalon - add in
scout bikes - same as now
Assault squad - add in options to remove JPs for a DT discount and take melta guns
Vanguard squad - cheaper base cost off 115, otherwise same


Heavy Support:

Support weapon squad - any combo of thunderfires and rapiers up to 3 guns. Rapiers 2 marine crew, thunderfires 1 techmarine.
Land raiders - all same except normal LR has capacity of 10 models.
Predator - same
Vindicator - same
Whirlwind - option for hunter AA missile
Devastators - points costs in line with BA codex, so 10 for ML/HB/MM, 15 for PC, 25 for LC.

General points:

Lower costs of storm bolters on sergeants in line with BA codex
Increase costs of storm shields in line with BA codex
Add flakk missiles to missile launchers.

Well that's my thoughts on the topic - please feel free to chip in others or pass comment on the above points. Cheers.

White scars in 6th edition

Hi folks,

Having now absorbed a fair chunk of the new ruleset into my meagre brain, I thought it would be worth a run down on the army I'm bringing to BW4 and the pros and cons provided by the new rules. This is in a way self-defeating as I'll be laying on the table the weaknesses of the army, but I'm not the competitve gaiming type and so am not really concerned either way.

Pros:

T5 for all bikers - well, this only really applies to multi-wound models but makes the Khan adn attack bikes a bit more durable.

FNP - now a 5+, but should make the command squad/Khan more survivable in combat and to low ap fire.

Random charge range - on average this should extend the bikers range a little on the charge. 

Flyers - as a stormtalon is part of the force, the new flyer rules make it much more survivable compared to when I last used it.

Combat squads - as both my tactical squads are rhino mounted, they now have much greater flexibility when disembarking in everything except kill/victory point missions.

Hull points - the manuvrability of the bikes and twin-linked bolters allows the stripping of hull points, especially when outflanking, from the vulnerable rear armour of vehicles.

Grenades - with all marines being grenade equipped it should now add a bit more punch to assaults by allowing an extra frag or krak grenade to be thrown into the equation.

Jink and turbo-boost - the continual 5++ helps with the low ap ranged weaponry, though I'm not so sure whether the 4++ flat out is necessarily going to be a problem. (now it's no longer 3++)  Most of the casualties I took were from high AP high strength weapons (autocannon dreads) in honesty, so AP wasn't an issue so much as volume of fire and high strength.

Look out sir - defintely more helpful in keeping Khan alive, an TBH I fancy his chances in a challenge too now that he can't be instant killed by anything shy of T10.

Cons:

No charge after deepstrike - this will hurt the outflanking army somewhat, especially where Khan and the command squad are concerned as this is where their main strength is.

Snap fire - in an army which relies to some degree upon assaults, snap fire may be a problem. If we take the example of a mob of 30 orks snap firing against a bike squad however, the 5 hits should only result in 1-2 wounds for a bike squad, so potentially one dead biker. Not sure how much of an issue it may be but it's certainly worth considering.

Psykers - more a list specific thing than generic, but my lack of psykers may harm psychic defence somewhat. Everything having a 6+ now helps though.

Furious charge - No extra initiative on the charge does harm the command squad somewhat.

Power weapons - as all my scars are armed with power swords, I guess I'll have to choose them as the default weapon. The AP3 nerf does leave me with some concerns for terminators and makes Khans weapon less effective. I think my army will need to use massed fire and manoevrability to deal with any potential AP2 nasties which I'm sure will crop up in tournament lists.

I will add more thoughts as they come to me but overall it looks as if the pros outweigh the cons. In other news there's a chance tha that the whitescars may not make an appearance at all at BW4. The heroes of Badab project is proving to be be far more interesting at the moment both in terms of paint scheme and modelling - as a result I've fallen a bit behind with the Whitescars schedule and am also pondering whether or not I should bring the Badab army instead. Both are a mammoth task to prepare so I need to commit one way or the other soon.

Showcase - Heroes of Badab - Exorcists and Raptors

Today is the turn of the two scout squads in the Heroes of Badab. Firstly, a squad of Sniper scouts of the Raptors chapter, which seemed only fitting given their preferred tactics and Primarch origin. The second squad is from the Exorcists chapter, which boast an impressive 3 scout companies. Note the hexagrammic wards and freehand chapter symbol. Sadly for now there won’t be many more entries for a while as I have no other squads to paint up in different schemes, only a few vehicles, which are too large a project to quickly bring to the fore. Keep an eye out for more in the future though. 

 

Showcase - heroes of Badab - Howling Griffons and Minotaurs

Now that the Space Marine army showcase is no more I have the chance to introduce you all to the new showcase in town. Check out the new tab on the left titled Heroes of Badab for more info on this quirky little project. For now though check out the first additions below sans their chapter badges. Comments and criticisms mcuh welcomed. Enjoy.