Valkia's Universe of Darkness (Chaos, Inquisition, Necrons, Kill Team and Tyranids)

[Firedrake Cordova]

That is quite the lucky eBay find!  

[Dr_Ruminahui]

Some nice work!

 

A thought on the duel diorama is that the genestealer's claw holding the helmet doesn't make much narrative sense.  I think it would make for a more cohesive "story"  to either swap that claw for an empty one or give victim-Titus a bare head and a pose like the stealer has just torn it off his head.

[Valkia the Bloody]

1 hour ago, Dr_Ruminahui said:

Some nice work!

 

A thought on the duel diorama is that the genestealer's claw holding the helmet doesn't make much narrative sense.  I think it would make for a more cohesive "story"  to either swap that claw for an empty one or give victim-Titus a bare head and a pose like the stealer has just torn it off his head.

Well, the Titus vs. Broodlord figure is not to be taken on it's own. It should be taken in the context of my new Tyranid army.

The bases of my big monsters are littered with Astartes corpses. 

Titus is the last man standing.

The broodlord is mocking him. 

[Valkia the Bloody]

I have made it a personal tradition to go shopping with my nieces and nephews for their birthdays.

We often also visit the local Warhammer store, because there are always free miniatures to be had and the kids can paint something or look at the cool displays.

Yesterday, I took my nephew shopping, and we again stopped at the Warhammer store. 

We both got the free miniature of the month (it appears to now be a rule that the mini has to be assembled in store, so we did some assembling). 

The mini of the month is a Ratling Sniper. 

I bought the old metal ones back in the day, and they have always been some of my favorites. 

So I am looking forward to painting this little guy:

 

In addition, of course with my poor impulse control, I bought more stuff.

As I have mentioned before, I did read Cult of the Spiral Dawn (love Peter Fehervari) during my holiday, and I was impressed.

In the book, the Genestealer cult hypnotize the Sentinel pilots of the Guard regiment, and the Genestealers ride into battle on top of the Sentinels. 

Sorry, but this is just too cool to pass up.

I needed to recreate this. 

I personally would not start collecting a Genestealer cult army, since horde armies would be very detrimental for my sanity.

But with a Tyranid army, I could just add the odd models and use them as proxies. 

So behold! 

My new Pyrovore! 

(rule of cool for the win)

 

Yes, there is a Termagaunt (surplus from the Warhammer store!) sitting in front of the sentinel on the base, and on top, a mighty Aberrant is riding into battle.

The skull of a dead Tyranid is used as a figurehead- no doubt a revered relic of the cult! 

 

 

 

Then there was the question what to do with the leftover Aberrants from the box.

I just decided to built them up and use them as a proxy 5-man unit of normal Genestealers.

To get the fifth model, I just searched through my collected bits and kit-bashed a fifth member of the unit.

He just stole parts of armour from slain enemies and is wearing them. 

 

And the completed unit:

 

Since my swam planet Innismouth also harboured a Genestealer cult (like the sinister fish-men cult in Lovecraft's story!) I think this is fitting for my army. 

And just adds to the horror I want to evoke. 

 

(after I had looked at the pictures, I noticed all the gluey-strings, which I have now removed)

[Valkia the Bloody]

Today, I finished painting the 11 Neurogaunts:

 

Their brain-bug leader:

 

Close-up of the troopers:

 

So my army has grown quite a bit since I started painting 4 weeks ago, here is my Tyranid army so far (they are on my Xenos shelf, next to the Necrons):

 

I really like how the organic look came out! 

 

Since I am feeling motivated, I am also going to paint the Tyranid Prime in October (plus the two Fantasy figures for Halloween, but they do not count as non-40k).

I already started on the Tyranid Prime:

[gaurdian31]

These look great, especially the brain bug!

[Valkia the Bloody]

Since I already posted it in the Jokaero challenge-

the other day I found one of my very old converted models.

I converted it 15 (!!) years ago.

I will try and also finish him until the end of the year.

Here he is, Wulfgar the Angry, Wolf Priest on bike- he is a conversion of the old metal chaplain on bike. 

 

 

Maybe, one of these days, I might work through my accumulated pile of shame. 

[Valkia the Bloody]

I have done some more work!

I am on a roll here, and my motivation comes from listening to some great Black Library audiobooks.

Today, I finished listening to "Deathworlder" which is a great book- full of action, featuring great interesting characters, getting deeper into the way of thinking of both Cadians and Catachans. It features the last Imperial Guard survivors fighting back a Tyranid invasion. 

 

I am also happy I chose a very fast paint scheme for the Tyranids.

I have a full time job and while I love panting, I now just lack the time and patience to spend hours on just one figure. 

This paint scheme is very simple, but effective and looks very organic. 

Not sure I should share the secret (well, the older ones among you might have already guessed) and some people might laugh since it is an oldschool method (I am getting old.....)

Spoiler:

Spoiler

To tie the Tyranid color together, I use a coat of dark brown semi-gloss wood varnish on top of the GW paints. This makes the models look slimy and very organic. I stole the idea from a opponent at a Tournament who had a whole Tyranid army that looked very organic like swamp toads, and his secret was this wood varnish. 

Back in the day, I even had used the wood varnish "dipping" method for a Deathguard army I had 15 years ago.... this was years before Deathguard became the first Chaos Poster army of GW. It also looked very nice- I have sold the army long ago, but kept two Marines for unknown reasons:

 

I finished my Tyranid Prime:

 

Swamp base:

 

I also painted up the mini of the month, a halfling sniper!

He is a great model and I had fun painting him. 

 

 

 

Edited October 16 by Valkia the Bloody

[Firedrake Cordova]

I do like the subdued "natural" tone of the carapace on the Prime

[Valkia the Bloody]

So as you can see with that old converted metal wolf priest further up, I once upon a time planned on doing a Space Wolf army. Which I never did, in the end.

I still have a squad of highly kit-bashed veterans, heroes, the old Fine-cast Arjac Rockfist terminator (complete with very droopy-bendy hammer) and the odd bits and bobs sitting around in my great shelf of shame. I like the models too much to give them away, however, I also do not "feel" like starting a Space Wolf army any time soon.

This is one reason I finally pledged to paint the Wolf Priest on bike in the Jokaero challenge, to finally get him painted.

Looking at the other models, I suddenly had a streak of inspiration.

One of the Wolf Guard veterans would be awesome to add some comic relief to my horror Tyranid army. 

The whole swamp theme going through the whole army is depicting an active, confusing battle-field, where desperate Imperial defenders try to stop the tyranids.

There are skulls and bodies everywhere, of different Guard regiments and Space Marine orders. 

The whole army is telling small little stories (like the ripped-off chain sword dislodged in the carapace of my Leviadon Harpy) and amid death and destruction, I thought of adding some levity. 

So I had two ideas for comic relief to add to these little battle stories told with my army. 

The first one features a Brood Lord (that big empty base was just screaming "fill me up!") and a mischievous but severely suicidal Wolf Guard trying to poke the Genestealer's bottom. 

 

And the other idea is hopefully arriving tomorrow- I ordered several cheap (20 Euro!) bits off Ebay, because there is one Tyranid figure with such a weird pose, it was just shouting at me to make fun of. I will post pictures as soon as it arrives and I have put it together. 

 

Doing a narrative army, where different things are going on, brings me back 20 years when I did my Warhammer Fantasy armies and created larger unit filler bases. 

I hope adding this extra uniqueness to the army will help me to keep motivated with the army. My ADHD is a pain, and painting hordes of "standard" gaunts was never going to happen, my brain would literally shut down after a while for lack of stimulation. But adding unique tidbits to some of the larger bases will help break up any monotony. 

[Valkia the Bloody]

I spend the day doing some more painting and listening to audio-books. 

So after 15 years of sitting in a dark corner of a shelf, my converted Wolf Priest finally saw the light of day and a coat of paint.

Here he is, Wulfgar the Angry, riding his trusty bike:

 

Back in the day, I already loved muddy bases and my bikes back then were only glued on by the back tire and I had used a mix of wood glue and superglue to form tire tracks. 

I still very much love the idea.

 

Some more pictures of the bike:

 

 

 

[Firedrake Cordova]

I like the idea of the tyre tracks.  I've seen several people make them by simply rolling a spare wheel through texture paint as it's starting to dry, which is so simple it feels like cheating.  

[Valkia the Bloody]

6 hours ago, Firedrake Cordova said:

I like the idea of the tyre tracks.  I've seen several people make them by simply rolling a spare wheel through texture paint as it's starting to dry, which is so simple it feels like cheating.  

Well, back in the day when I did this, I wanted to do REAL work. Those texture paints were not around then, either. 

Now of course, being older and wiser, I probably would go with your suggestion. 

[Valkia the Bloody]

Right, I finished another figure, but since it is the Plague Rider and a Fantasy figure (and Forum rules say these should not be shown), I will put it in Spoiler tags.

We could also say that this is the ephemeral figure of a Harbinger or Doom coming over my swamp planet of Innismouth to foreshadow the arrival of the Tyranids.

Real reason I am showing it at all (beside being proud of it) is, that I was using it as a test model for a metal color scheme.

Since I am going to paint a converted Sentinel / Pyrovore, I had 2 thoughts on how to paint that sentinel.

I do NOT want to paint it as a normal guard sentinel. 

The two options I thought of were:

1. Painting it completely in camouflage colors, using the colors of my Tyranid splinter fleet as the camo colors. 

2. Having the Sentinel old and rusted, it sat around in a swamp too long, so now it is a heap of mucky rust. 

I am still not sure with which option to go with.

The Plague Rider is my test model, to see how the rust works with my swamp bases. 

I am not sure- does this fit with the rest of my Tyranid army? The rust makes it a bit too reddish. It will stick out like a sore thumb. 

If you are curious and would like to offer an opinion, the non-40k figure is now in "spoilers".

If you think you are offended by seeing it, then just ignore the presence of the spoiler, or go with the "ephemeral Harbinger or Doom" being seen by the still loyal citizens of the Imperium living on that doomed swap world.

Spoiler

 

I would like to emphasize that this is not for breaking rules for the sake of breaking them, I was painting this model as a "Halloween" model anyways and said from the start (see further up that thread) that I could as well use it as a test model, since I LOVE the model and was very motivated to paint it. I have a full time job and limited time, so doing a 40k model just as test model was just not in the schedule (or the motivation). 

Hopefully my Ebay buy arrives tomorrow, then I can show some more real Tyranid content. 

Edited Tuesday at 09:53 PM by Valkia the Bloody

[Firedrake Cordova]

If you paint your sentinel in the same colours as the rest of the Hive Fleet, it will blend in and "fit" with the rest of the army in terms of colouration, although I'm not sure that a vehicle would look "right" painted in those colours?

 

If you painted it as a rusty relic that's been reclaimed from the grips of the swamp, then it would stand out a bit - there's a reasonable argument for this, as centrepiece models are often slightly different in terms of colour/texture.

 

Maybe you could paint it as though the paint has mostly flaked off to the primer (allowing you to use a neutral grey or red oxide, depending on taste), and then add some rust and corrosion? I think the rust tone in your harbinger model is a little too bright to be used in large patches?

[Valkia the Bloody]

1 hour ago, Firedrake Cordova said:

If you paint your sentinel in the same colours as the rest of the Hive Fleet, it will blend in and "fit" with the rest of the army in terms of colouration, although I'm not sure that a vehicle would look "right" painted in those colours?

 

If you painted it as a rusty relic that's been reclaimed from the grips of the swamp, then it would stand out a bit - there's a reasonable argument for this, as centrepiece models are often slightly different in terms of colour/texture.

 

Maybe you could paint it as though the paint has mostly flaked off to the primer (allowing you to use a neutral grey or red oxide, depending on taste), and then add some rust and corrosion? I think the rust tone in your harbinger model is a little too bright to be used in large patches?

Thank you for your Input. 

Yes, I had similar toughts. 

But I like the suggestion to do a mix of the the options- painting most of the Sentinel in hive camo colors and then have paint flaked off with rust showing there. That is a great idea!!!

[W.A.Rorie]

Great stuff. 

[Valkia the Bloody]

My latest Ebay find has arrived here. 

I paid 20 Euro for all of this. 

Behold- a mighty Psychophage for my Tyranid army! 

 

I actually thought the pose of this figure is a bit silly. I am also not a fan of the smoke stacks up top. Now that I have it right in front of me, it is growing on my, however.

 

So the Psychophage is busy devouring some Astartes morsels at the front, while the back of the figure (with that silly pose!)  just invited me to create some mischief.

 

Front of the base:

 

I recently listened to the BL book "Deathworlder" and first wanted a Cadian or Catachan attacking the Psychophage (in the book, it is a Cadian with a power sword). 

But when I looked at the available figures on Ebay, none of them spoke to me.

Then I had an even more awesome idea.

The members of the ratling Kill Team are sold for less than 5 Euro per figure.

So I decided to go with the halflings instead. 

I went with a normal gunner and the bomber guy (as some explosives might be the only way to put a dent into the monster).

I just had painted the mini of the month (the halfling sniper), so painting some more of them would actually be awesome. I am not planning on collecting the full kill team, but having the chance of adding these two figures to a Tyranid monster as comic relief was VERY hard to resist. I have always loved the ratlings and have the old metal sculpts still in my collection. 

 

These guys are now sneaking up to the Psychophage from behind, valiantly trying to place an explosive under the tough shell of the Tyranid and therefore destroying it.

These might be some of the biggest heroes of the Imperium! (even if they are small in size). 

Seriously, this silly pose of the model was just asking for this! 

 

 

I admit I am having a lot of fun putting this Tyranid army together. 

Buying half-price models on Ebay is even more of a bonus. 

 

[Firedrake Cordova]

Love it!