First Look: Kings of war & GW venom or homegrown?

I might as well start with the kings of war review...

I was asked by a new chap at the club if I fancied a bit of kings of war, and me being a system whore accepted, fantasy is something that doesn't really float my boat unless its warhammer quest and that's a different story for another day, but with the beta rules being free as well as Mantic just about to release orc's I decided to get some use out of the orcs & gobbo's that I painted for the latest warhammer which I don't really like to be honest.

So initial thoughts on the game:

Not too bad actually, I've had mixed reactions when I've told people that I was going to play but the rules are fairly simple and the combat is interesting the nerve test is very clever and the bigger the unit the more "nerve" you get which I like, the orc army list is still being tested so feels a tad overpowered as every once has +1 to damage for brute strength.

even with only a 500 point army list I managed to field:

2 Ax regiments (120)
1 great Ax regiment (105)
1 Gore riders troop (80)
1 Krudger (115)

throw in some banners (+1 Nerve for your unit) and musicians (-1 nerve for the enemy) and you 66 orcs running around the table!

the army selection is quite simple, one core troop unlocks one warmachine/hero choice which is nice and easy rather than percentages, the other this I really like is that armies (evil) undead, "chaos" dwaves & orcs and (good) evles & dwarves can ally with each other and when they start doing neutral lists they can be included, so can give you a bit of variety when choosing what you want as well as painting options.

So onto the actual models...

I'll be dead honest the elves are shite, the undead and the orcs are shit hot, the normal and abyssal dwarves are "ok". but pricewise its a no brainer! 60 zombies for 30 quid! why thank you!!

this is something that I would play again and I'm looking that the mantic range of orcs to see how they compare to the GW ones that I already have or I could flog the GW orcs on ebay and triple the amount of models from the price that I could be for them.

have a look if you fancy it... www.manticgames.com

So with all the rage of the recent price increases resctrictions on selling to the otherside of the world the dark eldar releases have not had the postive comments that they deserve, I think that the all look supersexy par the venmon, I don't know why though? I know the venmon is a viper thats been nicked by the dark eldar and pimped out so that it they can go crusing for bitches, but it looks too much like a vipe (if that makes sense?)

so the GW venmon...

very pretty & nice and nice paint job..

my version, bit more "spikey" and longer looking?

ok so I prefer mine but its £28 to get both kits compared to the £18 gw kits so ok 10 quid more expensive and if your on a limited budget then the GW kit is the choice but if I was to continue the dark eldar then I'd only and another 1 or 2 venmons and convert them in the same manner but slightly differant detail as I'd imagine each one would be decorated differantly according to the squad riding in them.

so onto what I've been splashing paint on recently...


after picking up some more epic bits on ebay I added to the huge marine army with a couple of units of land speeders, a couple of tactical detachments, a couple of assault detachments. With the 2 thunderhawks that needed finishing and the "strike" cruiser the marine reinforcements look like:

I need to stop myself from getting more epic though... I've more than enough!!

So with the hail Caesar game approaching fast I blasted out a 40 celt warriors and a skirmish unit of slingers

painted with the army painter dip technique that I posted about a while back, and I'm liking the overall appearance of the army, only another 40 warriors, 10 cav and some command guys and that lot will be sorted, not too sure if I'll pick anything else up though I did go a bit mental with the French and have quite a lot left over that I need to either do something with or get rid of!

so with just over a week of the month left and spencer picking up some GHQ stuff for me at triples its time to get a shift on and I'm looking to clear this lot by the end of the month...

so 10 T55's, 10 T72's, 5 BRDM-2's, 5 recce jeeps, 9 lots of infantry, 6 epic marine rhinos and whats left of my FOW british before I pick up any thing else.

Assuming I can get that lot done that should put me at:

Bought:  54
Painted: 114
Difference: +60

not a bad result at all and as I'm not really after anything at the moment next month should be a bumper bonus with the CY6 models that I need to do and the rest of the celts to finish.

Raiders of the lost archon...

well its been an intresting week....

Came down with a wicked cold that knocked me off my feet workwise and gaming wise, I had to cancel three games! thats a rare moment for me.

but I did manage to get a bit of painting done

 Now for what ever reason I decided to paint the three raiders at the same time? and they look "ok"
 

tabletop wise they'll look fine, when you look at them up close the ink didn't quite have the effect that I wanted, and the big flat panels where a ball ache to get right, as for the white sail I tried it quite a few times keeping the paint watered down but the actual brush marks made it look shit, so I decided to ink it with green and then use a sponge to give it a mottled look.

I might go back to then and do bits here and there but I just wanted to get them knocked out really, 


Now these guys where lovely to paint, and after spencers suggestion with the horns on the helmets aka get rid of them, I think these look so much cooler!

So a 99% finished lilith just go to do the flag on the base and she's good as done, might use her as a witch leader though as she's crap against T4 space marines! 

 and the Archon just the base to do and again he's done and dusted!

So after a three week break, the "machine" is back, just in time for a shag load of time off work over the crimbo period, that should give me enough time to get finished what I've been meaning to do for a while...

Dark Eldar Venom Reversed Engineered.....

Ok so going on the picture of the Home grown venom that I found,

I decided to reverse engineer it and make my own, now I've tried to find how the original chap is so that he can get the glory for the initial conversion but to no avail? So if you do find him lurking somewhere on the net let me know ;)

What you'll need:

1 Viper kit
1 Raider Kit

So I decided to start off with the rear of the model first I clipped off the side panels and marked out where I was going to cut them

So after a bit of chopping and what not I stuck the rear part togeather...

And decided to start work on the engine block, again I marked where I was going to cut

I then grabbed the first part of the viper I was going to work on, again marking where the cut was going to go

And after a bit of a dry fit it looked like the following, Now I've removed the runes as I figured that the dark eldar wouldn't really have them all over there transports its more of a eldar thing, but looking at the picture I did miss some!

a differant angle of the above

And a quick dryfit of the actual viper or whats left of it..

And with the meduim of blue-tac what its roughly going to look like..

Now I didn;t really want shuriken catapults on the model due to the fluff factor and I like little details like that as they give the model the "pop" factor, so again the place where the cuts are going to take place, i.e. a slither of plastic to be used as a filler for the underneath of the viper weapons area.

So this is where I'd gotten to so far.. (I decided to change the pilot later on rather than using the basic eldar guy)

close up of the engine block stuck to the rear of the model, I'd stuck some addational engine bits from the other floor part that I hadn't used as a filler so that the gap wasn't too much

and after ripping the upper torso and arms off the orginal guy I cut one of the crew at the waist and used the drivers arms and clipped the "handle bars" away from the control panel

After a bit more dry fitting I put some more engine parts to hide the gap and these would be visable if you looked at it straight on, kinda giving the impression of air inlet ports?

So I decided to take the plunge and stick it all togeather, by this point I'd clocked up about 2/3 hours worth of conversion time but most of that was sussing out how the other chap had done his and most of the time was spent on the engine detail

a differant angle from above, I'd also started sticking the first of the spikey bits on

and a shot showing the underneath,  now I used the new style flying base housing from the raider kit and used the gun shield to bulk up the main viper bit that joined the engine block, I then had to go into work which helped as I wanted the basic model to be nice and dry when I worked on the next parts

Ok so after a hardcore shift at work I decided to crack on with the rest of the venom, but I forgot to take pictures as I was going along (I was way too excited about getting it finished!)

so all thats changed on this picture is...

I've used the rudders from the raider kit to give it a bit more of a "dark eldar" feel.
put some spikey bits round the rear and along the front of the viper canopy.

Converted some splinter cannons from the heavy weapons and stuck normal rifle bits on the front, these are differant lengths but still look cool.

Put some chain bits on the side of the gunshield.

A couple of more blade's on on the rear so that it extends the point of the rear blades but decided to leave a gap, so that it kinda fits in with the theme from the bikes. and an addational pair of blades on top of the viper wings and where the raider bit meets bit the angle of the pictures you carn't really make them out?

and thats it one venom!

not overly complicated, but looking at this model I'd reduce the spacers between the engine block and the rear of the viper, also make the rudder blade a bit further apart rather than nearly touching at the front.

But I'll sort out those bits on the second one that I'm planning on doing, now one thing that I did notice when looking at the codex on the throne (as well all do don't deny it!) is that the venom can take two splinter cannons thats a whopping 12 shots hitting on 3's and always wounding on 4's very nice me thinks!

Anyhow, what do you think? what would you change? or is that plently enough conversion wise??

More Dark Eldar....

well its been a productive week to say the least!

I've managed to get the 2nd warrior squad done as well as the wyches,

so the second squad is armed the same as the first lot aka, blaster & cannon, this time the squad leader is armed with the agonizer whip rather than the power weapon for a bit of a change, I've painted them in the same technique as the previous unit but managed to get them done a little quicker now as I know what I'm doing with them, 

now with the wyches I wasn't too sure how to do them as they wear half armour, half kinky pvc...

so thats 2 10 man warrior squads and a 10 man/woman wyche squad, only the transports to sort out and a blantiant rip off of...

home grown venom

a superb conversion and really got me juices flowing so I picked up a raider and a viper to hack to bits, and just for good measure a squad of incubi to occupy it!

but before I sign off I'm gonna vent my anger....

I wanted to get hold of...

Please wait

Image not available

so rather than doing the smart thing and pre-ordering via the website I figured that I'd pick one up on Monday from my local shop but this wasn't to be as some gypsy thieving bastard decided to clear out the shop of all of the webway portals and if you have a gander on ebay at the moment they are going for the best part of £20!! frigging money grabbing dicks. Well I'll just make my own! ;)

anyway comments etc welcome as always,

Cheers Ant.

Dark Eldar Warrior Squad & some friends....

So after the test model I figured I'd better crack on with the actual army...

So this is the first unit of my Dark Eldar I also managed to make it onto the from of the Heresy forums with the step by step guide which I was quite chuffed with and been asked to do more step by step's which I'll be doing for Spencers next "Challange Ant"

Anyway onto the pictures... 

I've done the crystal chambers in a jade colour to break up the gun and to pratice painting that colour as Spencer has given me a really cool idea that I might just have to steal ;)

Unit leader with power weapon or agoniser depending how flush I'm feeling, I really like the sculpt of the head as it reminds me of a dire avenger

So the "friends" I finially got round to finishing the extra members of the noise marines to take them up to the fluffy 6 man squad and Lucius never tried him on the tabletop but always liked the model. 

So all I've got a little bit left for the chaos so shouldn't be long before it's finally finished off, I'll have to sit down and work out the points at some point but I must be approaching 4ish thousand!

Anyway time to crank out another unit of warriors... ;)

Dark Eldar Warrior Test model

Well it was going to happen as soon as I could get my grubby little hands on them!

So after sticking togeather all the bits and bobs that I've managed to get I decided to get a test model painted up, now I used to collect Dark Eldar a long long time ago and these where a nice dark purple, the Incubi I painted in a dark red and I remembered how cool they looked at the time, so I decided to follow the old school path and go really dark red,

Step 1

Spray black & when dry scab red as the first coat, now the trick with this point is don't worry about being too neat and getting the paint into all the creases and folds of the model (you'll see why later)

Step 2

Red gore over the armour nice harsh highlights on this bit...

Step 3

Blood red edging highlight I keep mine a little watery so that I could semi-blend

Step 4

Ink the armour with Badab Black, and once thats dry I started on the detail, Brassy Brass for the Brassy bits and chaos black and boltgun for the first coat of the normal metallics

Step 5

Highlight the brass bits with Brassy Brass & chain mail. Highlight the dark boltgun with chainmail, and I did the skin loin cloth with dwarf flesh highlighted with bleached bone

Step 6

Ink the non armour areas with Devlan mud and I decided to go for a desert themed base as I was getting bored of "normal" looking bases and the lightness of the base is a complete opposite to the darkness of the model so I think it suits it well.

I was tempted to go down the resin route with regards to bases but I'm still in two minds on that one, also I showed Spencer some pictures earlier via my phone and he's suggested painting the oval chamber thing near the rear of the gun in a differant colour, agree or disagree??

Anyhow hope you found the above useful and as always comments welcome,