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

[Firedrake Cordova]

Vince Venturella and Fine Scale Modeller both have videos on making and using sprue goo - hopefully they should help?  

 

As an alternative, I quite like Vallejo's Plastic Putty, because it doesn't attack the surface (like sprue goo does), and can easily be cleaned up with a wet paintbrush before it dries (I used it to fill the joins on my Aeronautica Imperialis aircraft without any issues).

 

On the assembly side of things, if you're not going into a competitive environment, I'd normally say go with whatever you like the best, because GW often "tweaks" the rules, so what was a great pick suddenly isn't.

[hd3]

I finally applied the demon flesh parts to the Venomcrawler. The pink on the tongues looks really patchy though, I think I might switch to a citadel pink and redo it.

 

My highlights with flayed one flesh on the back though came out terrible though.

[Pearson73]

The combo of daemonic flesh and the scaled armour looks ace!

[hd3]

Finally added some more details! I went with runelord brass on some of the bolts and joints to bring in some warmer colour. I'll probably give it some more nuln oil gloss later on those spots. Meanwhile on the back, I did a coat of Abaddon black over the rear armour which I'm going to edge highlight with the same formula as the black on my legionnaires, mechanicus, eshin, etc. I also did some Balthazar gold on the plating in the rear exhaust chimneys. 

 

What I can't decide about are the heatsinks and the cables. The heatsinks I thought I might do with runefang steel and then a thinned down brass scorpion. Because the orangey brass would stand out nicely against the black metal. What I'd like to do would be a tiny red glowing effect just around the very edges of the heatsink. But I don't think I have the skills to pull that off on such a tiny piece.

 

 

The main worry I have now is the cabling especially the big concentration above head. For the obliterators I used mechanicus grey with a thinned down black templar wash. Which was fine with one or two cables but with a big bundle like this, I'm not sure what to use. Black seems too likely to just blend in but if I paint them too much like real cables, I'll just end up with a distracting rainbow instead of a pop of colour between the flesh and the armour. 

[Firedrake Cordova]

I think if you paint the cabling black, then they'll probably become "invisible". Having said that, you don't really want to paint them in a way that stands out (red, green, yellow) because you probably don't want them pulling attention to themselves, so what about neutral colours, like a mix of mid- and darkish greys?

[hd3]

 

I went with brass scorpion on the heat sinks but the edge highlight came out a bit thick on the last layer. It's really hard to edge highlight that angle once the model is glued and based. 

 

I used the really thinned down gore grunta fur to pick out the skulls on the cannons and several of the metal joints and gaskets. Finally I went mechanicus grey for the big cables, while I'm using black legion for circulation pipes and a bright primary colour like green or yellow over grey for the two or three thin cables.

 

I don't know what to paint for the parts where the cable's outer layers have torn away though. I don't want to use a silver since there's so much silver and metal already. I could use runelord brass but I've used that for so many joints and welds already.

 

Edited January 14, 2024 by hd3

[hd3]

I did most of the cabling and touched up the last of the metal details. I think I might wait to finish the building debris bits until I get the paints for my sandstone formula so I can make it look the same as the other debris. I'm debating if it's worth doing an edge highlight of administration gray around the exposed metal inside the cables.

 

 

Edited January 21, 2024 by hd3

[Firedrake Cordova]

Looks like they're nearly done

[Dr_Ruminahui]

Your venomcrawler is a thing of (terrifying) beauty - I'm really looking forward to seeing it done.

[hd3]

Finally got a chance to paint again and did the base. I got the rubble froma painter we met at boiler. I tried to make it look like whole relief was from the same building as the rubble that came with the Venomcrawler . I gotta get a proper tool to move that stir land battlemire around. Does the base look sci Fi enough though? It's from Warhammer fantasy originally. I was thinking of adding some more mechanical scrap so it looks more futuristic. Or is the space marine corpse and the cables enough?

 

I tried to make the material look like sandstone from the mugs of doom recipe but it came out wrong. I don't think I'm skilled enough to do it justice. It still came out looking reasonably stone like though so I'm happy enough. This was my first time using non citadel paints and I could feel the difference 

Edited March 30, 2024 by hd3

[Firedrake Cordova]

I think the debris looks fine - there are plenty of places in the Imperium which have ancient buildings, and your Venomrcrawler could just have "vandalised" one  

 

If you're concerned about it, do you think adding a little razorwire would help?

[hd3]

12 minutes ago, Firedrake Cordova said:

I think the debris looks fine - there are plenty of places in the Imperium which have ancient buildings, and your Venomrcrawler could just have "vandalised" one  

 

If you're concerned about it, do you think adding a little razorwire would help?

That's a good idea! How do you do razor wire easily in 40k?

[Firedrake Cordova]

You can buy it ready-made from Army Painter or GreenStuff World, but it's also really easy to make as it's just a thin bit of wire wrapped around a thicker bit of wire, with the whole lot then wrapped around something round-ish (like a pencil).

 

Whilst there are some more detailed methods of making it, probably the easiest tutorial is one GW did around 2002 as part of their "Defense" set of scenery articles.

[hd3]

I managed to just barely successfully prime two units and their bases before my can of leadbelcher ran dry. After I went with a zenith highlight of Tamiya TS 30 Silver just on the top. I applied a few more coats of leadbelcher and silver this time to try and get a stronger contrast. 

 

For the Havocs , I realized the lascannons would make it impossible to paint some parts if I fully assembled them, so after the initial primer, I blu taced the helmets and arms in place for the zenith highlight. I wanted all my havocs to have lascannons for gameplay reasons but I've been designing the havocs to look nom chaos corrupted. So I went with the non chaos star version of the lascannons on 3 of them and scraped off the insignia on the other. I kinda messed up the gun and the shoulder pad with my knife though. 

 

I also really wanted to avoid having any repeated limbs by giving all 3 the same arm, so for two of the havocs I added a bolt pistol and a chainsword from my raptor kit. Neither of these apply in gameplay terms, they're just for aesthetic reasons. 

 

 

For the warp talons it was harder to avoid repeats of the same part. I grabbed some additional chaos shoulder pads for the right side  so they all had different shoulders, though I accidentally did use the same one twice. I also swapped out the front half of the torso for some mk 4 torsos so they're all different. I went with the mk4 because the harness matches up nicely with the raptor/warp talon harness.

 

I also used raptor helmets as well as the more mutated warp talon helmets. I figured if I ever add raptors to my roster, I can use the 30k legiones astartes jump squad.

[Pearson73]

I think barbed wire would be a nice addition to the Crawler's base. I can really recommend the one from the Army Painter. Very reasonably priced and you get loads!

[Firedrake Cordova]

I'd say the bit-switching works well  

[hd3]

This is the havoc where I had to remove the emblem. It really didn't come off cleanly. 

[Firedrake Cordova]

Maybe it got hit by some bio-acid, shrapnel, etc? Just a thought  

[hd3]

On 4/12/2024 at 6:42 PM, Firedrake Cordova said:

Maybe it got hit by some bio-acid, shrapnel, etc? Just a thought  

See, I was thinking that but then it occurred to me, how can I make the decal and paint reflect that?  Paint in discoloration and burn marks somehow?

 

Or alternatively how can I smooth out the shoulder pad and the side of the gun, given it's basically impossible to get my knife in there?

Edited April 13, 2024 by hd3

[Firedrake Cordova]

I think the normal approach would be to paint the damaged area as "bare adamantium" (i.e. silver)?

 

The other option, if you wanted to smooth it off would be to look for a chisel-shaped blade - either a #17 scalpel blade, or if you've got a regular blade the point has broken off of (I had this happen to one blade, and I ended up sharpening it on a sharpening stone - it's quite useful).

[Pearson73]

I think battle damage always looks cool and helps the model feel more grounded. I tend to start with silver and then liberally apply browns and blacks as grime and rust.

[hd3]

Finally got the blue base coat and tidied up the silver details on my first unit of talons! I'm not sure what to do about the colours on the claws though. I wanted them to be a stronger contrast but the brighter colours some people use on lightning claws just look goofy. I thought maybe go over them with black, then layer on iron warriors with runefang steel edge highlights? I'm open to suggestions though if anyone has alternatives. 

 

I'd also like to get the eye lenses to pop out a little more than previously. I like the wazdakka red with nuln gloss but I'd like the colour a bit brighter. I wish I could do the lenses like the MK vi tactical squad lenses on the Warhammer site. Those look tremendous.

[Firedrake Cordova]

I think black with a very bright silver edge highlight could work on the claws - it'd certainly have some contrast.

[hd3]

5 hours ago, Firedrake Cordova said:

I think black with a very bright silver edge highlight could work on the claws - it'd certainly have some contrast.

Would it look a bit silly with the black jump-packs though? The jump-packs will be mute grey highlighted though with significant bronze parts so they won't look too similar

Edited April 29, 2024 by hd3

[Firedrake Cordova]

I don't think it would look silly with the dark jump packs