Ace does a Thing - ETL 2016 - Vow 1 Completed!

[Ace Debonair]

Apologies for the slow replies.

Love it, Ace! I've been reading your thread the whole way through. Great mini's!

Love the story ideas behind the Iron Circle, too. It's a great concept, and I think it's fantastic that you're modeling each of the sides and chapters that take part.

Many thanks!
I'm going to get back into painting up more marines shortly, so hopefully they won't disappoint!

*giant picture*

...And then Balorn's helm was painted and doesn't really look anything like that hood.

I don't approve of the comparison, either.

EDIT:

In fact, let me make you a deal.

I'll trim down the crest on Sergeant Balorn's helmet, and then you can get that out of my thread.

[Ace Debonair]

I've now adjusted Sergeant Balorn's helmet.
Incarnus, you can get rid of that picture you posted now.



It was quite tricky to trim down since I couldn't lie the model flat, and I'll concede the paint job still needs a little work, but it's not bad considering it's 12:15 am and I'm very tired.

EDIT:
Actually, that looks a lot more lopsided than it really is.
Hmm.

I guess just after midnight isn't a great time to take pictures either.



Here's a shot that actually shows off his sash from the Champions of Athlum, too.
The crest's a lot shorter, and I'm not sure it doesn't just outright look better.

I guess sometimes less is more, huh?




Unfortunately, the helmet broke when I tried to trim it down.
Then the superglue stuck to my fingers as much as the model, and consequently didn't actually set correctly, as shown best from this side.

I'm pretty sure I can fix it, though.
But that can wait until I've had some sleep.

[Conn Eremon]

Just treat it as battle damage. :p

 

Anyway, I like it. Always one of my favorite MH armor sets. I do still feel like you should experiment with thinner . . . greenstuff, or whatever it is you use. This isn't my area of expertise. :lol: just seems a little thicker than it should.

[Ace Debonair]

Just treat it as battle damage.

Tempting, but I've got the liquid greenstuff right here, so...

Let's call 'battle damage' plan B.

Anyway, I like it. Always one of my favorite MH armor sets.

It's definitely in my top ten.

...I have a lot of favourites!

I do still feel like you should experiment with thinner . . . greenstuff, or whatever it is you use. This isn't my area of expertise. just seems a little thicker than it should.

I'm still very much a 'greenstuff noob', but I have the suspicion your advice is spot-on.

I'll give it a try with the next batch of troops.

[Ace Debonair]

Well, that didn't work.


It looks a little bit better than it did, though.



And the fresh touches of paint have helped a bit too.




So all things considered, I'm going to go straight to Plan B.

Battle damage, everybody!

[Nomus Sardauk]

Expertly played Ace. ;) :D

[Ace Debonair]

So with ETL 2016 bearing down on us like a thing that bears down on people, I've been making plans.

Well, just one plan, actually.
And it's pretty darn straightforward, in theory. Ready? OK, here it is.

Step 1]
Construct and paint Captain Ambrose, 1st Company, White Hawks

Step 2]
Recover from the shock of actually completing a model for the Hawks again.



...Unfortunately, it's probably not going to be quite so straightforward as that, which I'm sure everyone is surprised by.

'Cause you see, as a Monster Hunter player making a vaguely Monster Hunter-themed Chapter, I found myself wondering what a suitable weapon for Captain Ambrose would be.

And then I realised the mental image of a Space Marine with a Ravager Blade was far, far too awesome to ignore.


So, of course, I've had a go at building one out of plasticard.

It's a very, very rough draft, more to see how practical the idea was than anything, but here's what I've got so far:



Sergeant Balorn is there to provide the scale, and as you can see it's too darn big by far.

Yeah, I know they're that size in the games, but I kinda want a Storm Shield on my Captain, so this is supposed to be one-handed. Oops!



And there it is in pieces, the secrets of the ravage blade unveiled for all to see.

I guess my best bet is to trim the whole thing down a bit, and then it's just a case of finding a suitable handle in time for the ETL.
No pressure, right?

Of course, I'm open to other ideas if anyone's got them - I'm well aware there's a lot of modelling tricks I don't know!

[Ace Debonair]

"On that day, holding the line in the wastelands of Transcendence, I learned a horrifying truth. It is a lesson I will not soon forget.

Traitor Space Marines are capable of untold horrors in the name of their distant, mad Gods.

And yet, those that would hunt the traitors are capable of even greater and more terrible violence in the name of simply making a point."

~ From the memoirs of Lord Inquisitor Tybalt Maltire, Ordo Malleus representative of the Conclave of Thorns

[Pict-capture GRC75581: A ceremonial reconstruction of the armour of Captain Ambrose of the White Hawks 1st Company, Transcendence War Museum]

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

It's that time of year again - I've got the hobby itch again, and E Tenebrae Lux is just daring me to get stuff done, so here we are!

I attempted to trim down the Ravager Blade I was going to use, and after numerous attempts I got it to roughly the right size for a one-handed weapon. But...
It won't fit the Captain, because Ambrose's jump pack gets in the way. Oops!
And honestly, it didn't look that good anyway - I need more practice with plasticard before I can make stuff like that really work.

I'm planning, despite the plain-looking armour, for Ambrose to be pretty ornately decorated.
Emperor help me, it's time to try my hand at greenstuffing more Monster Hunter-inspired armour.

I only hope it goes better than my attempts to become a plasticard master have!

[Ace Debonair]

" When you've already faced down titanic beasts with hides thicker than steel, and fangs that can bite through metre-thick stone,

the prospect of facing another man in battle seems tame by comparison, no matter how many False Gods he claims empower him. "

~ Brother Barbaroy, White Hawks 1st Company

[ Pict-capture GRC75582: Examples of the additional scale armour worn by Captain Ambrose, featured on the greaves and left pauldron ]


-=-=-=-=-=

Progress!

My greenstuff skills aren't exactly the stuff of legend, but I'm pretty happy with how this lot turned out.

After about an hour of frustrating disappointment that almost saw me giving up on building custom armour for Ambrose altogether, things just seemed to fall into place.

Turns out persistence and patience are truly virtues when building models, and I really need to learn to slow down and take my time more.
But I can almost guarantee I don't learn my lesson from this and repeat all my earlier mistakes next time I do some greenstuff work, because I'm dense like that sometimes.

Also, there's a bit of new white paint and some gold for decoration on there. The gold soft armour's probably mostly going to be covered up when Ambrose is finished, but my Hobby OCD would haunt me FOREVER if I didn't paint it.

Now I just need all this greenstuff to dry, and then I can move on to the next step!

[Canadian_F_H]

Man. .. I am loving the wfb chaos warrior helms on marines... might have some lying around... after ETL I'll have to steal that idea for my black templars!

[Ace Debonair]

Man. .. I am loving the wfb chaos warrior helms on marines... might have some lying around... after ETL I'll have to steal that idea for my black templars!

Do it!

And post pics!

Templars are the ideal chapter to bust out some ye olde knightly visages on, and they'll look awesome.

Although I have to admit the main draw for me using them is not having eye lenses to paint, because I am pretty darn terrible at painting eye lenses.

Also; Progress!

My lighting-fu has failed me today, for the light blue armour on Ambrose's legs is in actuality quite lighter and much more vivid than the photo would make it seem.

Once I fix where I've been sloppy with the gold paint, this will be the end of Stage One for building Captain Ambrose, and I can move on to working on his coat and torso armour.

I'm enthusiastic and apprehensive all at once; I'm all too aware any success I've had with greenstuff has been by luck rather than skill, and that the more greenstuff work I do, the risk of me ruining part or all of the model increases exponentially.

...But then the same is generally true of my painting, so really, what have I got to lose?

[Ace Debonair]

Please excuse the double post, but I had some more hobby time on my hands.

Remember how I was all worried about making torso armour from greenstuff?

Well, here's the results:



The centre line is a bit wonky, and I might need to do something about that, but otherwise that's exactly the look and style I was going for!

Huzzah! Triumph!

And this time, it barely even took ten attempts to get right!
Much better than my previous twenty or so for the greaves.

And the left-over greenstuff became a bone circle for his arm, because why not. It's a bit malnourished-looking, but hopefully some paint will make it look a bit cooler.

All I need to do (apart from fix that centre line) is get some paint on this thing, and I'm ready to start actually building Captain Ambrose, for real instead of 'building bits and pieces of Captain Ambrose'.

[Ace Debonair]

Today has been a busy day!
Plenty of progress to report, so on with the show!

First, here's a few snaps of some painting in progress:



Jump pack, sword and board coming along a bit at a time. I later replaced the crude freehand on the sash attached to the shield, and neatened everything up a little bit as I went along.



Helmet, torso and arm armour with a bit of colour on them.
The red dots are there on the greaves too, but my previous pictures didn't do a great job of showing them off.

In fact, they look rather brown on the pictures despite being vivid red in reality. Weird!

And now the moment of truth; actually starting to piece together Captain Ambrose:



So far, so good!

Next comes phase two - building my planned monster-hide coat.

In order to do so, I decided to draw upon theEndless Wisdom of the inimitable Brother-Chaplain Kage, and decided to once more tred the path of the tissue-paper cloth decoration.

Here's how it turned out:



Hardly the most impressive feat of modelling, but that's much cooler than Chaplain Ferredun's cape turned out, so I'm going to call this a win.



That's actual billowing!
Even thinking about how long it would have taken me to get that effect with greenstuff is giving me headaches.

But how does it look with some paint?
Like this!



It looks a lot messier on this picture, but there's actually three shades of brown on this cape even before I started washing it with Agrax Earthshade.

But then, I wanted a nice dark brown, so I think I can call that 'mission accomplished' too.



Another shot of the billowing, now in glorious colour.

Yep, that coat is done and ready, waiting for the rest of the model to come together.


But then I came to a pretty big and very annoying problem.
I started putting Ambrose together, and had a little trouble positioning his arms so that his shoulderpads would fit:



So far so good, right?

But here's the problem; while I'd previously tried the shoulder armour and the arm, and tried the shield and the arm, I'd never tried to fit all three together until this point.

And of course, they absolutely don't fit together.
I'd have to either hack apart the shoulder guards or change the shield.
No problem - I've got another four Storm Shields... all for the same hand, none of which will fit. Curses!

I do have some pretty nice roman-styled shields I can fit on Ambrose's right hand, but then it turns out I have no suitable right hands to use to hold that shield.

At least the sword is less of an issue, I've got a few cool left-handed swords I can paint to take the place of my planned Relic Blade. And I suppose it's not like I can't use that now-painted sword for another model later on!

But for now my ETL vow has gone as far as it can go, because I need to order a spare right hand.

Thanks for reading this rambling tale of impatient and clumsy modelling.

Any thoughts, comments, crazy ideas, mockery, expressions of delight or disappointment are all equally welcome.

[Ace Debonair]

"The traitor's leader boasted that when blood spilt around him, it would empower his God. So Ambrose killed the heretic by breaking his spine in three places - a bloodless kill, despite his ferocity - and threw him to the floor, away from further conflict."

~ Brother Lukano, speaking of the battle of Fasnor, prior to the Lauss Rift Campaign

"What makes Captain Ambrose so dangerous is his wild temper and unpredictability. At any given moment, you can never be sure if you're interacting with Ambrose the shrewd diplomat, or Ambrose the raving zealot."
~ Brother Hayward DeArgamaine, Champions of Athlum Vigilant assigned to the White Hawks 1st Company

"Mark me well, Brother - I care not what plans the Great Enemy have for this world. I care only that they die, and die afraid of the Emperor's vengeance.

The White Hawks will defend this world, and stand defiant against the traitors until the end of days if the Emperor wills it. Now, will you stand with us?"

~ Captain Ambrose, addressing Chapter Master Brenen of the Vanquishers on the eve of the Battle at Transcendence, in the Lauss Rift.

[Pict-Captures #WBT66577015GYR - Captain Ambrose leading the White Hawks' counter charge against the advancing daemons:]

"Come, heretic! Face me! Or have your False Gods not given you the strength to face a real warrior?"

~ Captain Ambrose, challenging Apoquilus the Sly, leader of the 'Bonehewers' Warband, to single combat.



"The Battle in the wasteland, the first stage of the Battle of Transcendence, was undoubtedly the White Hawks' finest hour in the Lauss Rift.

Marou's forces in the wasteland first tried to drown the defenders of Transcendence under a host of daemons. The Inderdictors and Vanquishers held the line with the stoic, resolute discipline and inspired tactical cunning common to the Adeptus Astartes. The White Hawks, however, counter-charged the rushing horde, wrong-footing the heretics and completely blunting the advance of the traitors on the west flank.

At first it looked like the Hawks had lost their wits, but Ambrose was no fool. The White Hawks retreated back to the lines as swiftly as they had charged, before the heretics could properly counter their attack. And furthermore, Ambrose had shown the regiments on the west flank that the daemons could be killed. The effect on their morale was incredible, and the west regiments stood shoulder to shoulder with the Hawks even as the Daemons rushed their positions.

Eventually, Ambrose and his men did the unthinkable. The White Hawks broke the enemy line and drove them back. The Interdictors and Vanquishers, not to be outdone, followed suit, emboldened by the fiery battle cries and relentless aggression of the Hawks.

What was supposed to be a fighting retreat, simply an attempt to buy the hive cities time to prepare, turned into unquestionably the most one-sided Imperial victory on Transcendence.

Marou's vengeance against the White Hawks, when it came, was terrible. But this was unquestionably their moment of triumph."

~ From the memoirs of Lord Inquisitor Tybalt Maltire, Ordo Malleus representative of the Conclave of Thorns



"After the victory in the wasteland, Captain Ambrose made a point of planting an impromptu banner over the field.

It was just a crude wooden bannerpole, with the cape of Apoquilus the Sly nailed to it, now daubed with the words "Be Afraid" and the sign of the blessed aquila.

Beneath the banner lay the burnt, headless corpse of the Bonehewers' leader, thrown carelessly for the worms and ravens to pick over." - Colonel Bardian, Transcendence PDF 3rd Regiment

"His shield was a gift, from the Warminds Chapter, awarded to the White Hawks after the First Prontera Crusade. It still proudly displayed the honoured colours of it's previous Chapter, and was a symbol of the Circle of Iron's kinship.

His sword was an ancient relic, kept by the Adeptus Mechanicus for over a thousand years and gifted to Ambrose for the First Company's daring rescue of Explorator Fleet Damisca during the event known as The Bludruk Waaaaagh. It was expertly balanced and tempered, and had enacted the Emperor's wrath on countless foes long before the Lauss Rift was ever under threat.

His armour was ancient, skilfully crafted over decades in the ancient forges of Ultramar itself, long before the White Hawks even existed. The scales that adorned it were taken from a species of Talhonic monster so ferocious that even the White Hawks were said to treat them with quiet respect."

~ Excerpt from the writings of Scribe Nadenhof, on the Battle of Transcendence

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Vow Completed!

So I suddenly realised I had a suitable hand in my Devastator kit, and here we are!

Captain Ambrose, the leader of the White Hawks 1st Company and hero of the Lauss Rift, ready for battle!

For completeness sake, here's a picture of the unpainted shield, sword and hand I used to finish Captain Ambrose:

I had a lot of fun building and painting this model, even if I constantly had to revise my plans to make everything fit.


Thanks for reading and tolerating this exhibition of my sloppy painting, building, writing and camera skills.
All comments, thoughts, criticism, advice, barrages of insults and polite applause are welcome!

EDIT:

Fixed typos and added a few more fluffy snippets, for the fun of it.