Progress Log: Alpha Legion Warband: "The Last Surprise"

[hd3]

Not quite as productive today as I started late and I kept getting distracted playing final fantasy 8. I did get the thousand blues on the arms and shoulders though and did a recess shade of druchii violet. Looking now though, I might need to go over the recesses again with the druchii.

 

For weapons, I went with warpflamers and a warpflamer pistol. I know there is an inferno Boltgun but I'm just going to proxy that as a warpflamer as I just wanted to paint it for variety's sake. Finally, a soul reaper cannon for a little harder hitting. The purpose here is to have an almost all torrent weapon unit that can shoot normally on overwatch anytime.

 

I also started on the icon of flame. I'm thinking I'll use imperial fist yellow your the thousand sons ouroboros and corax white, then warp lightning and aethernatic blue for the flames.

Edited December 28, 2025 by hd3

[hd3]

Did the first coat of Abaddon black , Leadbelcher on the guns and reikland fleshade over the gold trim.  I also added the corax white and warp lightning over the flames on the icon. I think for the gold on the guns, I'll use metal medium instead of glaze medium to make the trim a bit more pale and stand out more against the black.

Edited December 30, 2025 by hd3

[hd3]

Just slight progress on the weapons. Vallejo old gold for the trim, a second coat of Abaddon black and Leadbelcher for the other parts of the guns. Finally nuln oil, over everything for extra detail. 

 

Liberator gold was added to the armour trim as an edge highlights as was  Ahriman blue over the thousand sons blue.

 

I also made the prototype for my mkii tactical veteran marines. Thanks to the alpha legions' special rules, I'm allowed to put banestrike combi bolters on these guys which is good because the regular disintegrator rifles are sadly more likely to backfire than a perpetually overcharged plasma gun which has never had maintenance. Thankfully, the heavy disintegrators are a better deal but you can only take two of them so I'm using the banestrike bolters to arm the other marines in the squad.

Edited January 1 by hd3

[hd3]

Finished the trim on the weapons today and picked out the gems and scarabs on the arms in blood angels red and runefang steel respectively. I also did the muzzle burn on the warpflamer pistol, same as my pyreblaster formula, seraphim sepia stippled in the middle, druchii on the right (overlapping) and talassar blue on the very tip. I also tried thinning white scar so it flows into the recesses more easily and using aethermatic blue to pick out the runes and the eyes of the gun. This worked way better than trying to free hand it with Ahriman blue like I did on the prototype.

 

For the staff, I used kroxigor for the eyeball, black legion for the pupil and a dot of white scar for contrast.

 

Finally volupus pink which I'm planning to wash with druchii for the fuel canister. 

 

For the tabards, I repeated the formula for the armour then in the cloth neutral grey by Vallejo, corax white, apothecary white and white scar on the tops. I still need to pick out the trinkets etc and wash the gold trim in reikland though. 

 

I also finally finished the icon of flame! I redid the icon in gold to make it look more like a part of the armour. Then white scar, warp lightning for the flames with moot green to highlight the raised flames and a dot of Caliban green on the edges. Finally, imperial fist yellow over the thousand sons ouroboros.

 

Next I'm attaching these tabards, painting the warp flame fuel canisters, bolt rounds and then attaching the arms at last. Then it's just the power packs on the back and I'm done with the rubrics marines. (Still need to do the bases)

Edited January 2 by hd3

[hd3]

Finished up the tabards and attached the arm assemblies. I solved the issue I had with the prototype and all the guns are held nicely. But by assembling the arms separately, I ended up creating a problem where the shoulders are slightly out of alignment on one or two. 

 

Edited January 4 by hd3

[Firedrake Cordova]

I really like the gold tone on the trim you got

[hd3]

19 hours ago, Firedrake Cordova said:

I really like the gold tone on the trim you got

Just out of curiosity the armour trim or the gun trim?

[Firedrake Cordova]

Gun (especially the rotor cannon)

[hd3]

On 1/7/2026 at 4:15 AM, Firedrake Cordova said:

Gun (especially the rotor cannon)

 

Thank you! I really wanted to differentiate from the trim on the armour. The metal medium really made it nice and pale didn't it?

 

Not much else to report except I realized the other day that I had the parts to kitbash a chaos lord with jump pack (almost). 

 

With the new nightmare hunt detachment letting you attach the jump lord to warp talons and renegades and raiders allowing you to just deep strike the lord off on the side of the board and generate cp, I thought this was a good time to make one. The body is a mkvi assault squad sergeant, while the elaborate alpha-corvus pattern helm is a leftover from my legion praetor with axe/master of executions. The power fist is from the super useful melee upgrade sprue while the arm and plasma pistol are left over raptor bits from my talon. I wanted the shoulders to look different though. This is not a HH model (40mm base) so his gear us clearly salvaged so I'm using primaris shoulder pads for the extra trim. I still need to attach the other shoulder. I'm planning to put him on the slightly raised debris left over from my possessed to help achieve the traditional tactical rock for assault troops.

 

 

 

 

[hd3]

Another small update today as I'm not getting much painting time lately. I've added the powerpacks to my rubrics and blocked in most of the colours. I still need to tidy up the gold trim, then highlight it with liberator gold. Nuln oil the tubes and the grills. Highlight the blue with Ahriman blue and add the iron hands steel to the grills in the bird heads on the aspiring sorcerer (I forgot them last night).  I also need to paint in the fuel canisters on the warpflamers.

 

The icon of flame attached surprisingly easy to the powerpack of the soul reaper cannon marine. 

 

Also loving that the cape on the sorcerer slides on so easily I can add it after I've painted and assembled everything else and it still fits easily. 

 

[hd3]

I finished the powerpacks, warp promethium canisters and added the decals to the rubric marines. I found the big circular tzeentch decals really don't adhere well to rounded shoulder pads. I actually found myself in the opposite of my usual view point wishing for a raised emblem. Eventually I settled for going back to putting them on the tabard after breaking the third decal trying to fit it. I wish the decal sheet had more of the non circular tzeentch decals; they went on nice and easy. 

 

Anyway, now I just need to do a round of micro sol and the rubrics are finished minus varnishing. Next it's just the bases which alas are still awaiting magnetizing.

 

I also finished assembling my chaos lord with jump pack. I settled for a raptor shoulder pad with a nice non chaotic (I scraped off the eight pointed star) shoulder pad and added a pistol holster on the leg before cementing him to the debris for stability. I'm thinking I'll add this broken rubric marine helmet for a trophy. 

 

Now it's back to my true love, the Alpha Legion.  I need to make a decision about priming now though. Should I keep doing Leadbelcher with zenith highlight of bright silver? It's been difficult in the past. Or just prime grey, then paint everything in bright silver before the nuln gloss wash?

 

 

[Firedrake Cordova]

I like the contrast between the golds of the trim on the flamer and armour  

[hd3]

Since I can't prime anything new because it's snowing and I've run out if stuff to paint, I've started early in my next phase of my warband: the Horus heresy grand building. 

 

I knew two things going in, I wanted different armour marks to reflect different functions and I hated the bonding studs on the mkvi marines.  So I added on an extra blank shoulder pad on my new big tac squad to represent the "alpha-corax" sub pattern.

 

I am going to use mkvi marines for regular battle line and assault squads (unless they release a mark iv or v assault squad). Mark ii will be special weapons and mark iii will be melee and breachers.

 

I decided I wanted my first big tac squad to use chainsaw bayonets, partly because they're distinctly 30k over 40k but partly because a tac squad with almost exclusively boltguns isn't much in close combat but I'm hoping mass chainsaw bayonets while more expensive will be enough to make a difference.

 

I also finally figured how to add the pouches, holsters, melts bombs etc. My problem though is getting the two arms to match up exactly with the Boltgun hands. 

Edited January 17 by hd3

[hd3]

As I slowly work my way through the cult marines, I'm moving onto Noise Marines now to give myself some flexible anti armour and anti infantry for RR. I've decided I'm going to go with helmets and painted legion badges for the sonic blaster marines while the blastmasters will get the fancy raised emblem shoulders and faces. I'm not sure about the head though. I kind of want to use the more Fulgrim esque face from the flawless blades with the long white and the rebreather grafted into the face but I'd have to buy that separately.

 

For bases, I plan to re use the marbled floor technique I used in my tormentor for the crusader host.

Edited Wednesday at 03:03 AM by hd3