Silvereyes' T'au Auxiliary

[Silvereyes]

Hello. I've been in the Warhammer 40K hobby for over 2 and a half years now, with my first and most beloved army, the T'au Empire. However, most of my T'au is still unpainted. There are some reasons, like being scared to be compared to the high quality of my fellow game club members, and at one point, being sick with pneumonia for 6 months. But a lot of it is also pure procastination and struggling to maintain a work/life balance. With me also starting a World Eaters army, starting a Skaven army in The Age of Sigmar, and also playing with Palanite Enforcers in Necromunda, my model backlog has been getting bigger and bigger overtime.

 

So, to have a goal in mind, and to also participate in the 2025 Call to Arms forum event, I want to tackle my auxiliary for my T'au Empire. The reason I'm not wanting to do all of my T'au is due to the scale. I have over 4000 points of T'au, and tackling it all at once is a bit too daunting. I also want to get my auxiliary battle ready, especially since my club will be hosting a casual 40K tournament starting in October, and I would like to field the Kroot Hunting Pack detachment. Also I would like to move onto another project, be it World Eaters or Skaven, after my auxiliaries, then come back and tackle the rest of my T'au.

 

My auxiliary come from buying 2 of the Kroot army boxes back when the Kroot range was refreshed and a box of Vespid Stingwings. I also plan to buy a few more Kroot models to supplement them. Also before the Kroot refresh happened, I also got some old Kroot Carnivores and Kroot Hounds, which I plan to keep and paint more for the novelty of it, and to help buff up numbers if needed. In total, the auxiliary project would contain:

 

40 x Kroot Carnivores (new)

16 x Kroot Carnivores (old)

10 x Kroot Hounds (new)

08 x Kroot Hounds (old)

12 x Kroot Farstalkers

06 x Krootox Rampagers (may get another box of 3)

03 x Krootox Riders (new)

02 x Kroot Lone-spears

02 x Kroot Flesh Shapers

02 x Kroot Trail Shapers

02 x Kroot War Shapers

10 x Vespid Stingwings (may get another box of 10)

 

I may do a few diversions on non-auxiliary T'au units that may wind up in my tournament list, such as Commander Shadowsun, an Ethereal, 1-2 Broadsides, perhaps some Crisis Suits. But I do want the focus of this project to be getting my auxiliary done.

 

I mainly use contrast paints, with a little use of metallic paints. Any feedback or advice is appreciated. I have little painting experience, and have only painted 10 Breachers (pictured below), 10 Strike Team, and 6 Van Saar for Necromunda. Thank you for reading.

 

 

Spoiler

 

[space wolf]

Army painting is no joke. Heres my advice:

 

1: decide on a scheme early. Paint a few test models, decide which one you like and stick with it.

2: You can spend extra time on centerpiece models, grunts get the least. Once they are all on the table, noone will notice that if you turn the model upside down you can see that you didnt paint the underside of the model's  crotch.

3: Batch painting is fastest, but not always best. To keep me motivated, i typically start by base coating all the dudes in the squad, then switch to painting one by one all the little details. It makes me feel like i get the fun of painting one model, but im still gettinf several done.

4. Your paintinflg will improve, dont go back. As your painting gets better, youll notice you may skip some steps or that the models are just better than the ones you did when you started. You may feel tempted to go back and repaint the older models. Dont, once they are all on the table, you wont notice it...well at least others wont.

 

These were just some.of my thoughts

 

If you have mostly contrast paints, thats not bad, especially since kroot are organic, it allows you to easily blend brown to green, etc. The trick is to get your undercoat right. I would suggest for ease of use, prime black or dark grey, then drybrush with a dark grey all over the model. Then a lighter grey on the upper half, then white at the very tops. Then when you put contrast paints on, it will tint the greyscale shading youve created to a shaded color of your choice. This is called slap chop. This will allow you to get many models painted in a small amount of time. This victory will keep you motivated to paint. Once youve got a handle on that, you can start experimenting with other more complex painting techniques.

 

Welcome to the other side of the hobby my friend. 

[Silvereyes]

On 7/28/2025 at 12:58 AM, space wolf said:

Welcome to the other side of the hobby my friend. 

 

Thank you for the advice, I really appreciate it. I plan to do a test Kroot in the method you describe and see how it comes out, just trying to find the time to do.

[space wolf]

Well, by all means, if you get him done, post him up! Id love to see your progress!