Advanced Infiltration: Heralds of Extinction

[Xenith]

Thanks! They're just the standard Mk4 combi with a short length of ball point pen ink tube attached! 

[Agramar_The_Luna_Wolf]

11 hours ago, Xenith said:

Thanks! They're just the standard Mk4 combi with a short length of ball point pen ink tube attached! 

Simple but effective

[Xenith]

So losing objectives and getting beaten in melee consistently has motivated me to build these guys up: Everyone's second favourite broken Ultramarines unit! I've magnetised them at the wrist so they can take Vanguard Veteran Thunder Hammers. I've not bothered removing the U's, as they're basically inverted Omegas...which fits. I worry that only 5 won't be enough, so I'm thinking about making some more. I should be able to scrounge up some bits to get similar models, or just bite the bullet and buy some more $$$

 

5 of these dropping out of a proteus with a praetor in a game should be fun enough though! 

 

[Xenith]

In addition to these, I've been working my way through a HH Alpha Legion job lot I got a few months ago, most of the vehicles were mis-assembled with some gates and pipes still attached, and then unprimed, so silver paint straight onto the resin - as such it was peeling off. I've been slowly strpping them back with IPA bath and toothbrush, and then conducting repairs and adding a bit of the ol' Xenith charm to them.

 

I'm not liking painting vehicles with the metallic teal, so I'm thinking that any rational Alpha also wouldn't, and they would probably choose to paint their units in some form of camo, as I tried with the preds. I've got hold of some digital camo stencils, and I'm thinking of doing the 'Ambush' units, i.e. tank destroyers, scorpius, etc, in black, with teal stripe, then digi camo. Might be an interesting look. 

[Xenith]

Cute metal box for my alpha legion. My tactical squads keep dying before that can get to objectives, so this will get them into rapid fire range fast, or around the board edge to an objective!

 

I find the fitting very tight on the base and the door, it's so tight the door doesn't really close properly, so I drilled out the door post holes with a 2mm drill bit (maybe 2.5) , which makes it a bit loose, but then I added a magnet to the chassis and door to help it stay up.

 

[Xenith]

I finally spent the time to get my Blood Angels Kratos to a finished state, over a year after getting it (due to indecision on how to paint it)

 

Tentatively named Midae Ultio, on account of it's size and all the gold. I really love this tank, it's like a battleship on tracks! Still awaiting a gunner for the top. 

 

Front view.

Terran Honours, Legio IX marking and weathering. 

 

More track weathering, back to bare metal and paint. The upper plate needs a vehicle ID number, but I forget what I'm up to, I think I have 10, so this might be tank 11? Either way, I went with tank 20 to be safe, this is the heresy after all! 

 

 

Extreme close up of weathering and peeling paint. 

 

Again, I had great fun weathering this beast, rhinox hide and a small sponge is some of the most fun you can have in this hobby! 

 

-----------------------------------------------------------

 

If you're following my 40k & HH Blood Angels Blog, you'll have already seen the photos up to this point, however this blog gets a couple of bonus extras...

 

 

Edited October 6, 2023 by Xenith

[The Pounder]

Great work Xenith!

 

The chipping is really well done.

[Xenith]

Placed my order for the Mk3 battlegroup today - really buying into the hype for the Mk3's and I'm pretty happy with how they look. At least 1 unit will get to be boarding marines, and another possible conversions to pyroclasts or interemptors...

[Xenith]

I got my Battle Group through and only just got a chance to play with it. I have to say, assembling threse mk3's is a joy, much like the Mk6 before them.

 

I've been playing round with some shields to make some breachers. This was originally going to be on Mk6, however that stalled when the rumours of new mk3 abounded...

 

Peek-a-CHOOM

 

Still not 100% on the mk3 iron warriors helmet on the sergeant. He also has a magged arm and wrist to swap out for a melee weapon. 

[Agramar_The_Luna_Wolf]

On 11/1/2023 at 8:52 AM, Xenith said:

I got my Battle Group through and only just got a chance to play with it. I have to say, assembling threse mk3's is a joy, much like the Mk6 before them.

 

I've been playing round with some shields to make some breachers. This was originally going to be on Mk6, however that stalled when the rumours of new mk3 abounded...

 

Peek-a-CHOOM

 

Still not 100% on the mk3 iron warriors helmet on the sergeant. He also has a magged arm and wrist to swap out for a melee weapon. 

I want to do something similar to this but for a Cheftain squad..

[Xenith]

18 hours ago, AGRAMAR said:

I want to do something similar to this but for a Cheftain squad..

 

Definitely do it, these are lovely models! 

 

So after a bit more playing around, I managed t get these done over the weekend:

 

5 breachers

 

The 5 more breachers and 5 culverins (awful photo, sorry)

 

And then the AL Angels Tears that I've been converting from Sanguinary Guard and other bits! Helm vents are a bit rough, but you'll never notice at arms length. 

[Xenith]

After the Mk3 swarm, I'm making up a plastic leviathan that I got last christmas to complete my talon of three, for Alpharius infiltration hijinks. I dont think much can deal with three levis in your face T1, and they should allow other elements of my army (the remaining 1500+?) to move up in peace. 

[Agramar_The_Luna_Wolf]

3 hours ago, Xenith said:

After the Mk3 swarm, I'm making up a plastic leviathan that I got last christmas to complete my talon of three, for Alpharius infiltration hijinks. I dont think much can deal with three levis in your face T1, and they should allow other elements of my army (the remaining 1500+?) to move up in peace. 

Unless you are playing a competitive  tournament, that's not going  make you very popular...

[Xenith]

It'll be for special occasions like apocalpyse games only, or if I know someone is bringing knights...

[Xenith]

Bit more work over the holidays to try and smash models out - this was a birthday present from my mum in...2022...that I've just finished!

 

Volkite (magnetised) Predator 'Ixian'. The pred is split into my faux-caunter three colour camouflage with some dditional things to break it up like variations in panel colour. Since this points it's been weathered, so I'll have to get some more pics (and paint the lights....)

 

 

I left this plate silver to kind of make the vehicle a little asymmetrical, with the idea of putting pne of the teal transfers onto it, howver they really don't stand out on silver - I think they're designed to go over white only, so it didn't look good. Current options are to leave it silver, paint it teal, or white and add the teal hydra. Any thoughts?

[StratoKhan]

I would go for silver myself, the scheme

Is very cool, I’m not sure a

single white panel would improve it. Nice work. One last thing- the bright green hydra heads on the black front armour remind me of monster energy drink. They might be a

little at odds with the rest of the scheme, which is more muted. Maybe the weathering has toned it down though.

[Xenith]

Haha, yea, I'm not 100% sure on them - they were a last minute addition to try and break up the plain black of the front plate a bit. Maybe they could do with a grey glaze over the top to tone them down. Or maybe just paint over entirely...

[Xenith]

2022

Test marine x2

Dynat

Vigilator

Contemptor dread

5 Lerneans

5 Catas

10 tacs

5 volkite support

5 Recons

Leviathan

Predator Sisyphean

 

Trying to tot up what I manged to paint in 2023:

125 - Autilon Skorr

100 - 10x mk4 tacs

290 - 10x lascannon HSS

275 - 10x Effrit

175 - 10x Seekers

175 - 5x Sekhmet catas

290 - 5x Fulmentarus

175 - 5x Headhunters

180 - 3x Grav Rapiers

60 - 1x Quad Launcher Rapier

105 - 3x Sky Hunters

180 - Contemptor

190 - Deredeo

400 - 1x Kratos

280 - 2x predators

190 - Sicaran (finished it off)

450 - Cerberus

 

70 models and 3640pts total. 138 wounds/hull points. 

 

Undercoated

5x Suzerains

5x Angels Tears

10x assault marines

10x melta support

10x breachers

5x Destroyers

5x culverin HSS

Land raider proteus

Rhino

Falchion

 

That's actually a silly amount of Alpha Legion that I've managed to get done, and pile of potential lists me at just over 5,000pts painted, since June 2022. So I'm clearly vibing with the army. I'm looking forward to seeing how much I can get done this year! 

Edited January 4 by Xenith

[Brother Kraskor]

With those figures, I'm starting to wonder if some of the models on my shelf are actually your Alpha legion who have started infiltrating other collections! Very impressive. And I love those clean stripes on the Predator, what is it about nice lines?

[Xenith]

Haha, potentially! After like, 5 years of umming and ahing about heresy, I went hard with HH2.0, and disturbingly the Alphas are approaching my BA in terms of assembled models. They're still 8k short of them painted though! 

[Xenith]

So my battlegroup is informally called by myself "The Siege Enders", and was formed around armoured spearhead, dreads, etc, and has Zones Mortalis in mind. With that, it would be rude not to include an Iron Warrior or two to help them in that aim, and as a potential allied detachment. 

 

With the advent of Mk3, I'm also considering some small projects of other legions to maybe represent preheresy formations, as while mass Mk6 is now tied to the heresy era, Mk3 is firmly agnostic as to pre or syn-heresy. 

[WrathOfTheLion]

I've been sorely tempted to paint up a squad for my Word Bearers in their pre-heresy scheme, as not all had adopted the new one by Calth.

[Xenith]

That sounds great, a nice change also from all the red - veterans, or a loyalist faction?

[WrathOfTheLion]

On 1/17/2024 at 5:18 PM, Xenith said:

That sounds great, a nice change also from all the red - veterans, or a loyalist faction?

Probably just line troops, as we know not all had adopted the red by then. So even a good bit into the heresy, the grey would've been around.

[Xenith]

Maybe the odd grey pad for a hotch potch appearance? Maybe an old pad was passed from a veteran to a new recruit who has kept it in it's original colours? If anyone is all-in on the imagery and meaning of relic items and idolatory, its the Word Bearers!