Somehow the first quarter of 2024 has already been and gone. So fast that we forgot to put out Feburary’s update! Let’s catch up on what the team’s been up to.
Rockfish
Well, I’ve been in a bit of a dry spell due to personal life stuff so I am a bit sparse in models, even including stuff from February, but hey I got a few things done at least!
The most obvious being this collection of Kroot that you might have just seen previewed a bit over a week ago!
Beyond them, I’ve also been puttering away on a random selection of things…
Including starting into a quick Iron Warriors scheme for fun!
Plus as a bonus, I think these models are stuff I had done but never posted on here before now due to the Brain Bads.
realSnice
Who let the dogs out? Since January I’ve been working on my #newyearnewarmy project with a 3000 point War Hound (Loyalist World Eaters list) for the NoVA Open. With that I’m about 1500 points inn and am thrilled with how this army is turning out. Technically I’m going to include a model from February, but thats because the Vigilator below marks a real big “hobby level up” for me and I’m proud of that. I hope to get all of my infantry done this month before I move on to my much anticipated Solar Auxilia.
SRM
Since February I’ve worked on a whole smattering of things, as my life has actively caught aflame and my increasingly rare hobby time has become more and more precious. Going back to school and having a career change at 33 will do that to you, I guess.
I have a number of extremely stupid lists built for my Templars, and all of them involve large numbers of Crusaders. Having not built or painted any since the launch box back in 2021, I finally expanded my Battleline selection to include more choppy lads. Painting Marines again always feels right, and I’m glad I got to play with the upgrade sprues this time around. I still maintain that this is one of the best kits GW produces, and strikes the balance of detail and open space I like on a model. You can really doll these guys up or leave them pretty bare bones, and they’ll have a ton of character regardless.
Part of the aforementioned stupid lists involves more Lieutenants, as 6 power fist attacks, 3 power sword attacks, and 35 chainsword attacks are a lot scarier when they’ve got Lethal Hits. 10 Crusaders with an LT have punched well, well above their weight time and time again, and this guy has been finding his way into most of my lists as a Tannhauser’s Bones-bearing LT, giving the whole squad a 5+ Feel No Pain when I’m in the right Oath. He was a fun kitbash of bits ranging from Champions to Captains to regular assault jamokes, and he painted up quickly. I also echoed his split heraldry on his left pauldron, which you can kind of see behind the shield. As I paint more characters for this force, I’m finding it fun to change up how I do their personal heraldries and unit markings.
Speaking of painting up quick, I blitzed through a pair of Manufactorum Ruins from my Imperium reviews. We’ve started up a competitive league here in Central Oregon, and I wanted to recreate the GW tournament experience at home. These buildings paint up quickly, lending themselves well to zenithal priming, drybrushing, sponging, and Contrast paint.
I also painted up some AoS terrain, as I’ve had these ruins sitting around half finished since like October. They’re the results of my first time using an airbrush, and I struggled a lot while I learned this new tool. I went in for a drybrush so I could better define the details and break up that too-clean “airbrushed” look on all the color fades, only for the brush to take the paint straight off. Next I had to wait over a month for varnish to come in, as the pass between here and Portland was snowed in and all the mail was backed up. By the time I could finally work on this terrain, my enthusiasm was low, but I powered through it and I’m genuinely pleased with the results. They’re more than “good enough” and I’m excited to put them to use once AoS 4.0 drops.
Not content to call it there, I finally got around to painting the Gladiator my buddy Ken gave me right before our live Badcast at NOVA 2023. This thing was somewhat dispiriting to paint, as every time I returned to it, there were another dozen edges to highlight. I stuck with my tried and true technique of painting all the hatches, turrets, and other doodads separately, finishing them before starting on the main hull. This kind of progress marker helps motivate me a lot when it comes to big models like this. Its been a mixed bag on the table, either cutting Knights in half or completely pooping itself and doing absolutely nothing the turn it arrives.
Back in January, a friend gave me the Crimson Court on a whim, and while I had to wait for a replacement face on Prince Duvalle (Ken coming through again!) I finally got around to painting them and Karlina von Carstein, the Warhammer+ subscription model for the year. My wife and I had just watched through Castlevania, and I just had to get a start on these backlog-dwelling baddies. I came up with some new techniques for the green and blue, evolving from my old Cursed City scheme to work up from darker basecoats instead of washing down from a lighter one. I’ve found this gives smoother results and avoids some of the ugly tidemarks that mar some otherwise clean paintjobs of mine. This gang was largely fun to paint, with only some minor grumbling as I worked around the greatmace dude’s cape interior.
I was still feeling spooky, and figured I’d get one more Soulblight Gravelord model down. I bought this dude at the Warhammer store that opened in Brookline, MA in 2016, and was going to use him as an Amethyst Wizard for my then-growing Empire army. I built him, primed him, and left him in a box until now, when I clipped part of his square base and stuck him on a 32mm round. He was such a delight to paint; all simple textures and expressive details. He was also my first time using Pro Acryl’s metallics, using their Light Bronze as my GW Sycorax Bronze has dried up. Consider my friendship ended with Sycorax Bronze, Light Bronze is my new best friend.
With that, we ride forth for April, where I hope to finally finish the Freeguild Cavaliers from my Cities of Sigmar launch box. I’ll have more words about them next month, when I can finally put them behind me!
Skails
I have two models this month. First up was part of a Secret Santa kitbash exchange I finally got around to painting. Two of my prompts for the build were Cult and Agriculture. This one sure delivered! It comes in at twice the height of your typical infantry figure, and is on a 50mm base. Made of twigs, wood, and plant material, with string wrapped around it and a few plastic bits thrown in. The string work really blows me away.
The other model was Qulathis the Exile from Cursed City. I picked her up and based her in my Sylvaneth scheme. This was a fun one to put a little extra time into.
Charlie B
The last quarter has involved only four minis for my various armies, but then (by my standards) a boatload of terrain. This makes me happy, because I have finally cleared out every single one of my half-completed terrain projects.
First, a Librarian in Terminator Armour. I like the detailing on the new sculpt, just not when it’s painted up like Tron. Other than the headswap, this is the stock kit, painted in a mad rush over a few days before I “needed” to use him in a boarding action.
This is the Warhammer+ assassin, just without the Statue of Illiberty. It’s a basic conversion, but if you want more angles and conversion notes, you can find it on the Beard Bunker.
Ah yes, the nuance brick. I swore blind at the start of my Goffs project that I’d avoid any wheels or tracks, having had my fill of that with my Evil Sunz. But the thing is, transport good. Conversions fun. Claw funny. And so: Squig Destroyer cometh.
Most of my minis take me a while. Sometimes I just want to paint a tank in 2-3 hours. This was one of those times. Used it in a game the next day, where it transported 10 Kasrkin to some very premature deaths at the hands of the Night Lords. The only conversion work of note here is that I removed the lasgun hedgehog array and put retractable flaps behind the portholes so that the passengers can shoot out if they’re desperate. Let’s not think too hard about the ergonomics.
Now then. The terrain.
I was running the finale of a fantasy campaign earlier this year, which meant prepping a bunch of buildings for the big siege. It’s probably a crime to rush Tabletop World buildings, but rush them I did. Not has hard as I rushed the old Warhammer fortress and siege tower, to be fair. But it all absolutely did the job from four feet away, so I’ll take it.
Obviously this isn’t the whole fortress; this was some extra bits I needed for the siege, as I needed a second gatehouse, more walls, and one extra tower. Heh. “Needed.”
With that out of the way, I knocked out a Sector Fronteris Killzone box. This stuff is sturdy as hell even without glue, so don’t glue it. That way, it packs down really efficiently and uses up very little storage space.
Casting about my cabinets for any other stuff that was sitting around unpainted, I found this old Forgeworld dugout, and blitzed it over a few hours.
Finally, a terrain project that accelerated my hairloss as I struggled to find an efficient way to paint it. I was never satisfied with the mediocre and time-consuming results I’d gotten on this thing previously, so I repainted the whole lot in the same scheme as the Fronteris stuff. It’s a really quick method, and I’m overjoyed to have this thing finished at last. We’ve previously explained this paint scheme on Goonhammer, and you can find that here.
The key thing about how I built this building is that it breaks down into four modular 2×4 sections:
This means it can go on the table as one big ruined building, one single-storey intact building and one single-story ruin, or two single-storey ruins. Now that I’ve figured out an efficient way to paint it, I plan to build another one of these, as it has a really impressive presence on the table. With the modular building method, I can combine it with existing parts to make a really tall building. Aww yis.
Soggy
This month was a busy one, with three different Heresy events in a row. Despite taking away valuable painting time, it ended up motivating me more to get stuff ready for them. First up this month was a pair of Javelins, which provide a bit more of an anti-tank punch compared to the Kyzagan speeder – which I normally don’t leave home without.
This was followed up by painting a 20 man batch of White Scars Inductii to use for an upcoming doubles event hosting by Greetings for the Warp. We’re both fielding footslogging armies which we are going to sling towards the enemy and hope for the best!
Having gone between foot slogging and bike focused armies for a while now, the next thing on the menu is to try an armoured company. I’ve managed to score a few tanks this month which I’m looking forward painting up as something different to hordes of smaller models.
Bair
I started the month off with the idea that I’d paint some of my Tomb Kings. And ended it having painted nearly all of them instead. I had barely painted anything up until March but something happened and I just went for it.
It helps that these are mostly old models with very little detail and a lot of similar colour, and that I’m choosing to keep them even simpler than I need to!
This whole process was just thoroughly enjoyable. These paint up so incredibly fast and there’s 20 archers that I forgot to photograph too even. And when I say fast I mean that Casket took about 2 hours, each character an hour or less easily, the bone dragon maybe 6 hours total because it’s a newer sculpt and so just has more detail; great model though, can’t wait to put it on the table!
I reviewed the chariots which are from Wargames Atlantic here and honestly they’re just a great kit, I love the simplicity in them.
All of that is about 2400 points before adding magic items but I need to build and paint a bunch more skeletons, tomb guard, tomb guard chariots, and scarab swarms still! Next month is going to be them and maybe a few Ogre Kingdoms minis to get a very very elite army going!
Cronch
It’s been a delusional kinda couple of months for me, as I’ve been deep in the Flesh-Eater Courts mines after painting that Varghulf Courtier last month. First off, I got a unit of Crypt Horrors done.
These are quite an old sculpt, and showing their age in some regards, but they’re still very characterful, gross guys and I had fun painting them. This scheme leans a lot on Pallid Wych Flesh layering, which is not my favourite thing in the world to do, but I think the stark white highlights really make it pop so it’s worth it. Shoutout to Monument Hobbies’ Pro-Acryl White for being an all-time great of a paint.
With the Horrors done, I decided to turn my attention to the newer sculpts from the army set, namely ten Cryptguard. These were a dream in comparison to the horrors, with lovely defined areas, and the addition of some metal parts to do some fun weathering on. I was struggling with ideas for the banner, so I decided to replicate my home town’s emblem of three black pears in a rather more gory fashion.
Straight after that, I jumped into some Morbheg Knights. I got the Nightshriekers (aka bat-things) done pretty quickly to a finish I was really happy with, and then stalled out for a couple of weeks on finishing them off. There is so much detail on these! I also tend to find cavalry sculpts hard to work on in general, with so many areas to cover, but still I’m happy with the result.
Finally, not put off by my experience with the Horrors, I jumped back into old sculpts with ten Crypt Ghouls. These are definitely showing their age too, but they’re full of personality and macabrely funny little details, and they painted up pretty quickly across a couple of hobby sessions. I’ve accepted a late spot on a team for the upcoming Bloodtithe AoS event in late April, hence the rush on getting all of these models done! If I don’t get the army done in time before list submission it’s OK, I have other options, but I’d really like a chance to get these on the table before we say goodbye to the third edition of Age of Sigmar and this will be my best chance.
Outside of the GW ecosystem, I painted up my first models for Conquest: The Last Argument of Kings by Para Bellum Games. I have a big pile of City States models to work on, but as I’m hotly anticipating the upcoming Sorceror Kings faction I am keen to get through these quickly. To that end I’ve opted for a kind of living statue concept army look, which is a bit over-done in my opinion but also a rock solid way of getting a reasonably aesthetically pleasing army onto the table quickly. Set off with some Geek Gaming Scenics Mediterranean Soil from their Base Ready range and some 3D moss made from flock and PVA, I think the ancient Hellenic-inspired City States models lend themselves well to this method.
So far I’ve painted a unit of Companion Cavalry and Ipparchos character to go with them, plus some foot heroes in the form of an Aristarch and a Mechanist, with more on the way. I’m hoping to get through a decent chunk of stuff after I’m done with my FEC commitments, so hopefully will have more to show off next time! Happy hobbying everyone.
“Contemptor” Kevin Stillman
For 2024, my hobby goals are to have 3,000 points of Dark Angels by the time of the 2024 Grand Narrative in Atlanta. While I have a whole bunch of Ultramarines, I wound up changing my painting style in mid-2023 with the procurement of an airbrush and learning how to use it. So in order to have a consistent style and not having to paint blue marines I already have a ton of, I went Dark Angels. As I noted during the last Hobby Roundup, I was somewhat hamstrung by the release of the new Dark Angels Deathwing box, because I really wanted the upgrade sprues and decals in them for what I had painted. Since I got those, I was able to crank out a non-trivial amount of Marines.
First is a Gladiator Lancer, in glorious green. I’m quite happy with it, but it was built according to the box instructions. Yawn.
I absolutely love the Land Raider Proteus. I think it’s the single best Space Marine tank kit that GW sells. I will build and paint them all. However, the Land Raider Proteus sprue does not come with any of the parts needed to build a Land Raider Redeemer. So they were procured from other sources. I took the Twin Heavy Onslaught Gatlings from another Gladiator Lancer, and the Heavy Flamestorm Cannons from a Land Raider Crusader I built at the 2023 Grand Narrative. These parts fit together fairly well, and so I’m happy. The turret can even turn!
Next is a full Space Marine Heroes Series 1 Tactical Squad. Because I got into the hobby shortly before the arrival of the Primaris Space Marines, most of my Tactical Squad Marines were the victims of various learning experiences and don’t look great. However, between the Space Marine Adventures Board Game and the re-release of Space Marine Heroes Series 1, I had enough unique sculpts to fill out a squad.
Like many at Goonhammer, I love the Astraeus. This time, I decided to build and paint mine using an additional three and a half years of experience while also not being sleep-deprived from managing my dog Kayla’s passing. I finished it up shortly before GoFest Sinnoh Tour.
At Warhammer Fest last year, I picked up the Wrath of the Soul Forge King box set because I had a coupon and the exchange rate between the US and UK worked out in my favor. I have finally built one of the models from that box – Grand Master Azrael! I finished the armor at home, but I painted the majority of Azrael while I was at Adepticon. More on that in my Adepticon article(s). Special thanks to my guy Craig Sniffen (MasterSlowpoke) for the C&C and advice.
I also decided to paint up a squad of Aggressors, because they’re a squad of big chonky lads who can take a pounding and they fit right into my Land Raider Redeemer.
While back at the LVO, I picked up a Tomb Kings Necrosphinx during the Old World Release Party that they had at 6 am on Saturday. Since I don’t actually intend to play Old World or start a Tomb Kings Army, I decided instead to make it a 40K proxy. So I also picked up the new Heresy Thousand Sons Sorceror and combine them to be a counts-as Mutalith Vortex Beast.
Lastly, I painted my first Battletech miniature at the “Learn to Paint Battletech Miniatures” class they held at Adepticon. More on this Highlander in my Adepticon article.
Loxi
Throughout most of 2023, I pledged to work on at least 30 minutes of hobbying every day. Whether it be painting, building, organizing, or just playing games at my FLGS. For 2024 I wanted to continue that trend and have thus far had a blast trying new techniques and skills for painting. I got bitten by the Underworlds bug recently, and my regular Heresy group has been having a blast with it. Of course, it’s a great excuse to paint these awesome models.
For Grinkrak’s Looncourt, I wanted to try out the fabled “Yellow Contrast over Pink with a Zenithal Highlight” method I hear Imperial Fist players across the globe swear by. I chose models that were a bit small and detailed, which meant a lot of weirdness when I was actually trying to poke out details and not mess up that contrast layer, but overall I’m quite happy with how they came out. It also was my first foray into glazing skin that isn’t human-toned, which was a great experiment for…
I’m not nearly as interested in Ironjawz-styled classic Orruks as I am with the new “lanky weirdo” Orruk that you see in the Kruleboyz range, but these were fun to paint. I used Juan Hidalgo’s Black Armor method for these, and it’s definitely a fun and fast way to get some nice looking results. This also was a great way to test a slightly different greenskin glazing method that I would go on to paint my Kruleboyz with. Speaking of which…
Age of Sigmar 4th edition is on the horizon, and I decided I wanted to try and quickly brush up a new army for the release, since I played Blades of Khorne for 90% of my time in 3rd edition. Kruleboyz are a far cry from what I typically play, both in aesthetics and in playstyle, so I thought they would be a fun trip from my usual aggressive-melee tactics I yearn for. My methods are a slight variant of RichyP’s way of doing them, so you’ll achieve similar results from that.
Lastly, with Heresy being what I would consider my “main tabletop focus” right now, I didn’t want to leave my projects in the dark. I love the concept of “modular” collections – being able to build and play tons of different armies with the minis I own is the appeal of these crunchier wargames. I’ve been bulking up some Death Guard for a traitor army, and I realized that my main army of Iron Hands would be a really fun ally to try with them, but I didn’t have any suitably traitor-y HQ units. One trip to my FLGS’s secondhand section and a bit of converting later, and I have what I think will be a really fun Iron Father to saddle up for the Warmaster.
DYLON
I have a lot of things going on in the background but I did manage to paint a few minis this month. I was prepping for a weekend of Necromunda hosted by the legend BuffaloChicken and as such, painted a few Van Saar that have been sitting on my to-do desk for…. years?
Two Augmeks, based on the same body, one as the kit came and another with a head from the resin Arachni-rig and a Grav gun.
Speaking of Arachni-rigs, this too was languishing on the desk, so while it was a quick paint job, it’s nice to have it done and dusted.
And painted up specially for the weekend was a Ridgerunner done up for the Ash Wastes. I’ve been painting all my Ash Waste vehicle with generic paint schemes so they can be used by any gang. I did a few tweaks, adding a gunner platform to the back and trigger grips to the Mining Laser and hanged out the little radar dish for a sensor from a Land Raider on top of a 90s fantasy shield, which fit the cupola perfectly. I also added stowage from a Cargo-8 and an antenna from the bits box.
