While it feels like 2025 has only just begun, the team have come out swinging with some awesome hobby to start the year. Let’s check up what they’ve been up to.
Soggy
I kicked off the year with a pair of Deredeo Dreadnoughts, starting off with the brand new Boreas Pattern kit which we reviewed here. I had the original plastic kit assembled and primed since release, although had parked it after my primer turned parts of it furry. Thankfully weathering powders and varnishes hide many sins!
I’ve also been working on some terrain for the upcoming UK Goonhammer Open, which I’m looking forward to sharing once we’ve got it completed as it is incredibly sick. Next up on the hobby desk will be my first set of Battletech mechs – the Somerset Strikers, a throwback to my childhood and a very kind secret santa gift.
Greg
I built a boat.
Rockfish
Bit of a preview-heavy month this time! We’ve got guard at the start of the month, plus some random scions I did…
…Then at the end of the month there was a small pile of eldar stuff to work on!
SRM
I’ve begun 2025 with the intention of bringing Big Dorn Energy to all my interpersonal interactions. I intend to lose several friends and several thousands of dollars in the process.
I was hyped as hell for the new Guard book, chiefly for the new Rogal Dorn Tank Commanders. In my excitement, I even saved our video review of the Hammer of the Emperor detachment for last so I’d have time to get this thing done and film some turnarounds. Fun fact: the varnish was offgasing heck of bad while I was shooting! I am very smart! I had a great time painting this big beaut, going harder than I ever had before on weathering – not just in the predictable ways like drybrushing, chipping, and slathering on watered down paints, but in researching how tanks accumulate grit and grime. A lot of time was spent on old man hobby blogs and tank museum photo galleries. Even before I’d done weathering and transfers I had the thought that this was my favorite tank I’ve ever painted, and I stand by that.
Following that big statement piece was a Cadian Command Squad, likely representing the most work I’ve ever put into like 65 points of jamokes. The bulk of them was pretty simple – I’ve got my Guard scheme nailed down at this point – but the sheer amount of stuff on the medic and vox operator slowed things down, and the banner took a load of work as well. I don’t know if it’s pound for pound the best banner I’ve ever done, but that’s certainly my best NMM-adjacent gold.
I feel like I’m starting this year strong with two “bests” but we’ll see if I can gain some more momentum. I’m thrilled to bits with these models, but 6 models a month isn’t exactly going to put a dent in the yawning void that is my backlog. Naturally, said backlog has immediately exploded with the introduction of all the new Krieg stuff, so keep your eyes on this space for more mud, blood, rust and dust as I keep the treads on this Guard project a-rollin.
RichyP
First Hobby Round-Up in a while, but I won’t cheat and put a few months worth of stuff in to make up for it, I’ll cheat and put two half months worth of stuff in instead. I painted in the 2nd half of December and the 2nd half of January so it’s still technically one month’s painting. There’s some 40k, some Horus Heresy, some Necromunda and some Old World.
First up, I had the idea of starting Craftworld Iyanden Aeldari as my #NewYearNewArmy thing, which held my focus for about 2 weeks and just about 1.5k of models. I won’t post all the models, but a couple of group shots and some characters (not in painted order).
Below is a group shot from the first week as it has the Guardians, Spiritseer and Warlocks in it, which I don’t have separate shots of.
Not pictured, because there’s a lot more of the same, are a Death Jester, 5 Dark Reapers, and 5 Howling Banshees. There’s pictures of them on Bluesky / Insta.
It took me until 2 weeks later to pickup the courage to paint the last model of the army, the big guy:
Took a break from Elves with a few of Horus Heresy marine testers, my favourites being the Night Lord and Emperors Children ones:
With Elves, and Humans (ish) done that leaves Dwarfs. I’m joining a Necromunda campaign this year (exciting because I almost never get to actually play games) and someone told GW about it, so they released some new bits for the Ironhead Squat Prospectors. I painted a gang in orange a couple years ago, but wanted to do a more standard theme (with a twist).
Last up for this month, and sticking with the Dwarfs/Dwarves, I bought the Dwarfen Mountain Holds Battalion a couple days ago because weirdly besides Necromunda, The Old World is one of the more popular games played here, along with Heresy.
I also repainted an old Battle for Skull Pass Miner I found in the same colours (he can count as a Battle Standard Bearer or something)
The idea is to paint the complete army up this month but deep down I know I’ll have moved on twice by this time next month, possibly with a quick detour back to Aeldari for some Fire Dragons.
Last minute update. I painted another 16 Dwarfs and my favorite paint job of all time, their boss King Bling, just in time for the end of the month.
The last minute additions make that a nice nearly round 95 models for “January”.
Make it 96.
Beezer
This was not a normal month of hobby. It was a perfect storm of having a ton of models one or two steps from being completed as well as being out of school for Winter Break. i definitely took advantage of these factors to finish up 36 (!) models. I haven’t had this amount of output since I’ve swapped over to almost exclusively skirmish-level games. That being said, I think I am most proud of the Trench Crusade Sniper Priest I painted up. I’ve pretty much got my style locked in for Marvel: Crisis Protocol and Star Wars: Shatterpoint, so painting an extremely grimdark miniature was a great change of pace. Back when I was knee-deep in the 41st Millenium and the Age of Sigmar, I would’ve never thought those words would come out of my mouth, but here we are. I also limited my palette for TC to 4 colors, and then blending everything. Whew, what a month!
Togepi
I am part of an affinity group at my work for parents of toddlers, and at a recent session we went around discussing what strategies we use to have some time to ourselves. When it was my turn I realized: I have no strategy. I do not take time for myself. I do not practice my hobbies. This was an upsetting realization, and since then I have striven to paint for 30 minutes each night. I am not 100% perfect, but I almost always make the time, and I have been astonishingly productive since I began to be mindful about this.
I think a few of these guys might have been painted at the very tail end of last year, but I’m tossing them all in here anyways.
First off, working my way through Ashes of Malifaux, I started with Jeb! (please clap) and his Habber-Dashers. I took the Coward’s Route on the pig and slapped some metallics on it, but the hatbots were a lot of fun – I took advantage of some of the Two Thin Coats triads I hadn’t used yet.
Next, I painted Hoochdini and Hopscotch the frog. I really like how the frog-skin texture came out here, and I’m looking forward to fielding this dapper duo (although I think Hopscotch is probably only a hire in Wong, not Brewmaster).
Speaking of cold-blooded swamp dwellers, here’s Bashe. He painted up in basically just one evening. Big and fearsome, though I don’t run Zoraida and I don’t know that there are any other masters that really want him.
I’m a huge fan of Mossbeard and the Swashbucklers. The Swashbucklers particularly are BEEFY by Malifaux standards, giving me nice large areas to highlight.
The Swine Twirler and Hog-Oil Salesman were a lot of fun, too. I am practicing a new technique for glass bottles, and I had a lot of fun trying it out on the Salesman’s rack of potions and unguents. (In extremely Tim Baltz voice): The elixirs!!!
Taking a break from the Bayou, I painted up the Keene twins. I am not thrilled with how Irena’s dress came out, but I love Altus’s coat, so swings and roundabouts here. These guys are closer to Malifaux’s “true” 28mm scale and so their details are very fiddly.
And of course there’s poor ol’ Cayce Jones, the train-ghost-man.
Finally (for Malifaux at least), I decided to paint up the two Moon Shinobi I didn’t have finished yet, so I could at least run three if I want to go full-on Shitters (a technical Malifaux term meaning “a horde of cheap dudes”). I practiced the bottle technique here too.
Moving to AOS, I have been making slow progress on the Carcosan Legion. I finally finished a full squad of ten Fusiliers (plus ammo twink). They look great, but my heart hurts at the thought of doing this three more times.
Also, here’s a spooky doot doot guy.
Finally, I completed the Pontifex (a Christmas 2023 present!). She has found a higher power even than Sigmar. The scalloped tatters of the King in Yellow must hide Yhtill forever.
Scrivo
In preparation for Kill Team @ Warhammer World (with John from CYRAC) in January I felt I needed to do something *actually* special other than a default box for Angels of Death.
Currently I’m on quite the run on Hobby, Videos and playing as Dark Angels. So rather than using the rather lovely default sculpts from the Starter Set, I looked to do something more Robed and hooded. Risen Angels of Death.
My previous attempts at this for an Intercession Kill Team last edition were not quite enough, so I begged my local community if anyone had some Leviathan Sternguard going spare. Combined with a Master Lazarus, the New upgrade sprue and my bitbox of stupid Hoods I got each model to be unique but also clear on which Operative they were to be. Rather than the Heavy Intercessor Gunner standing out for having no robes, the Sternguard Heavy Bolter proxied in (similar height so it was okay for KT).
After the event came and went, I was still not entirely happy with my team, my default for my armies basing is Astrogranite with a purple tinge. Combined with the Black power armour they looked a little flat. My good friend who went to the event with me Adam had done some fantastic basing on his Plague Marines with autumn leaves to act as a flash of colour on their murky bases. I was jealous!
So then I had the concept: Forestwalk basing. Echoes of Caliban but with green leaves, moss and a brown mud to warm up the bases!
Michael O “Mugginns”
I’ve been doing a bunch of Bag the Hun in my basement in prep for FlintCon coming up this weekend. Tiny planes are really easy to paint but harder to decal because the decals are so small. They look so cool, though.
NotThatHenryC
Recently I’ve been working on a couple of reviews and not had much time to do my own stuff. I’m pretty happy with Marshal Dreir from the Krieg box, though sorry I didn’t finish more of the other models. They really take a lot of effort to finish. Good luck to anyone making an army. It’ll look amazing – eventually.
I had more fun making and painting a Malcador Infernus for 30k. This is a wonderful kit that goes together really well. I’ve done a few of these SA vehicles now and I’m a bit tempted to make an army of them at some point in future. The great danger of reviewing stuff is this ending up with fragments of multiple armies, all of them tempting me to buy them a lot of little friends.
I’m really happy to have finished my Killzone Volkus, which I think has come out pretty well. I spent a long time adding basilicanum grey and drybrushing this at first but I then had some fun adding some colour to the floors and doors, followed by loads of dirty down rust and moss.
This dirty down stuff is great. I’ll be using it on more terrain in future, though hopefully in warmer weather. It doesn’t smell good!
Thundercloud
I painted and finished 50 models in January. I know what you’re thinking, 50 goblins is a big number but it isn’t super impressive. No, it’s 50 models from a bunch of different things.
Firstly there are Underworlds warbands, of which I painted five. I mostly paint Underworlds figures for Warcry, and having another five warbands painted up really helps add variety to Warcry games, but with three warbands from the current edition of Warcry painted so I have the option of playing that as well.
I also painted up a Skaven Engineer from the new AoS starter set, Skaven Tide.
I used Thondia Brown, a nice brown with a slightly chocolate tone, as the underpaint, which worked well as many of the colours were browns or worked well with a brown base.
I also painted up enough models to play Fallout factions, as I picked up a lot of figures in the recent Mophidius sale.
This gave me enough Fallout figures for a Super Mutant gang, though I need more for a gang that doesn’t have 40% of it made up of a rampaging cocaine bear and a robot.
Finally I painted a squad of Void Viridian Marines, giving me some generic guys for sci fi games, and the start of a Void 1.1 or Urban War force.
So that’s 50 miniatures comprising 5 Underworlds warbands, an AoS character, 17 Fallout Miniatures and 8 Void figures.
I painted 150 figures in total last year, and 100 of them were Legions Imperialis so much smaller than 32mm, and now I’ve done 50 32mm figures in a single month, giving me enough figures to play Underworlds, have plenty more figures for Warcry, and play Fallout factions. I hope next month I do as well.
Andrew_N
I painted sixteen tanks this month. The trick to racking up so many finished vehicle models is to make sure the tanks in question are the tiny kind. These are all part of a push to clear out my Legions Imperialis backlog before moving to other hobby projects this year.
First off were my Malcador variants – these Infernus tanks and Valdors were an absolute joy to build, and I am blown away by the tiny details crammed into them.  In general the Malcador tanks are some of the prettiest tanks in the Legions Imperialis range, and these are no exception.
Shadowswords were my favorite superheavy tanks in the ancient days of Epic:Armageddon (the last major edition of tiny 40K/Heresy that GW produced), so I could not pass up on the opportunity to paint up a company of them for my Solar Auxilia army for Legions Imperialis. Gorgeous vehicles, and with so many details that I seriously might consider devoting the time to painting one for a painting competition in the future.
My last superheavy tank is a Stormsword – the Shadowswords box comes with two of these, so after building three of those I decided to build one with a big siege gun!  Looking forward to making buildings drop with this in future games.
Keeping up with the siege gun theme, my last block of completions was these Leman Russ Demolishers.  I already have full companies of Vanquisher and Battle Cannon Russes, so this seemed like a logical next step. Might have to build and paint some Exterminators or Annihilators in the future.
Overall though, this was a strong start to the year, and I am hoping to keep the hobby momentum up going forward. Hoping to get some converting and painting done for Trench Crusade, and also have some projects for Horus Heresy and Old World brewing as well.
MasterSlowPoke
I’ve gotten a little bit of a slow start to my 2025 painting. My only major painting accomplishment was my second unit of Deathing Knights:
I started these in December but couldn’t get the time to finish them until mid-January.
Speaking of December, I painted my first-ever Ultramarine, a Cato Sicarius conversion, for a Secret Santa present. I didn’t want to throw it in last month’s roundup, so I’ll put it here:
I’m really surprised this is the only Ultramarine I’ve ever painted, despite being in the hobby since 2009. He was actually quite fun to paint – I get why the scheme is so popular. Definitely gives me ideas for my eventual Roboute Guilliman!
Saffgor
January is quite the month for me, as I’ve finally gotten the models in-hand to start scrimmaging with my 2k for the current meta! The Ash Waste Admech have every bit of scaffolding needed to be playable, (mostly) painted, so now it’s come time to focus on some of the more fun units.
Case in point, I’ve been having a lot of fun working on my Kastelan Robot conversions; they’re the one model in the range I especially dislike, so it was imperative to see them changed. Here, I’ve lopped off the legs of the Ambull and given it the height needed to stand at shoulder-level with the original, as a kind of misbegotten buggy servitor.
In a similar vein, every leader on a 32mm or smaller got finished this month, here my 3rd Marshal, an Enginseer, Eversor Assassin, and Technoarchaeologist. Making sure these models would stand out amidst waves of nomadic Skitarii was important, so special attention was paid to having them stand a bit taller, and ideally stretch out from the base as to have a larger silhouette.
Hopefully by next month, Cawl & the Onagers, in all their buggy glory, will be ready for battle, and I can’t wait to get them onto the board. Really, the best part of this whole project has been finding ways to approach conversion in ways I hadn’t previously, and I think these Onagers are perhaps the single-best representation of that growth.
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