Sons of Modinel Update

[Azanulbizar]

The only possible thing I can see is that squad 2 has a little red on their bases.

However love your marines, and nice idea with the little combi-flamer token. Keep up the good work!

[Breazer]

very well coolio stuff in here lewb
and you snowed on all the bases so they can go with the cool table you have ...
looking forward to those army shots....i also love the little guy with the flamer you made to go with the veterans...i might have to steal that idea for something if you don't mind..

anyway...keep up the awesome work...this is really turning out to be an incredibly interesting marine force...to say the least

[Tzarinchilla]

love, love, love. fancy a game on saturday at GW??? Please And also do you tell them apart as one squad has red scenery on the bases and the other has metal with verdigris.

I think it's this too.

Superb marines. I thought you where just a fantasy man, but these are brilliant.

[-BoBo-]

Awsome!!
give us more

[Npf6]

Can you show us some up close shots of your hq? he looks cool bit i cant make out the details in the army pic. love the bullpup design might try that on a few of my guys

[Lew_b81]

Hey I'm back!

Petay: It's not just the Scouts that aren't easily identifiable, my whole army isn't! I'm just a terrible person to play against.

Tom: I know this is super late, but I'm not even back in Cheltenham yet. I'm actually half way through packing and took a break to post. I should actually be free on Thursday night for vets night if you fancy a game then?
Oh and you were totally right about the base colouring!

Azanulbizar: Yeah I wish I'd thought of the combi-flamer idea before making the second Sergeant with the flamer built in. Oh well.

Breazer: You steal away, I'm sure it's not entirely original. And thanks!

Tzarinchilla: Yeah I actually prefer 40k, but those Ogres are a labour of love, so end up taking up 90% of my hobby time. It's good to get back to my roots a bit.

BoBo: Okay!

Npf6: Yep, can do. I've got some shots of him now, so I'll post them up in a few days or whatever.

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So as Tominator rightly guessed, the Scouts are distinguished by the stuff on their bases. One squad has red details, the other squad brass and verdigris. It's a really simple technique that means you don't have to worry about squad markings or anything, and also helps you identify them at a glance. It also helps your opponent (if you tell them!), and as I often use the Sternguard squads together for maximum impact, that's kind of important.

Enough about that.

I'm going back to university today! Boo hoo no more Xmas!
That means I'll have less time to paint, so that step by step Terminator will take a little longer (I'll most likely post it up in sections). However, I do have a little buffer of photos I haven't even taken off the camera yet, so I can carry on updating with a certain degree of regularity.

For today though, we have the first Sternguard squad's Razorback transport. Hooray and such.

First up, some photos of it before it received the special treatment:



It's pretty okay. Hinged doors are a nice touch. Completely pointless, but I love that look on my opponent's face when I say my squad is disembarking and I flip the doors open!

So I attacked the Razorback with a few new licks of paint and a healthy dollop of snow, and we end up with this:



I'm pretty hesitant about making any significant changes to the painting of this army. I like that it shows how I was painting at the time I first did it. But the vehicles are a bit of an exception. I really hated the battle damage I had on there before. It was big and ugly. And I can do it much better now with very little effort. I didn't go overboard on it, trying to keep the overall level of skill around the same, just changing the style a bit. I painted over the areas of chipped paint with the base coat mix, and then went back with a sponge and some chainmail to add the chips back on in a more realistic way.
I also changed the tactical symbol on the side to a Crux Terminatus.

Conversion wise, I've used the FW dozer blade and turret. But I didn't like that the turret was so low that it would blast off the radar dish with a slightly misplaced shot. So I raised the whole back up a bit using the underside of a Predator turret.

One of my favourite things about the Rhino kit is the interior detail. It's just a shame there isn't a special kit to show the interior of a Razorback, as it has less room because of the weapon stores. So instead, I made my own:



I carefully sliced the top off (this was back in the days before razorsaws, so I did all that with a scalpel. It took a while), then placed tiny magnets around the top (I used the same to keep the doors in place). The interior has had one row of seats taken out, and lascannon generators (made from the remaining turret pieces from the Predator) put in, going up to the ceiling and turret. Ta da!

Oh and finally, here's a shot with the squad:



They look pretty cool all together like that I think!

And that's that. More updates to come within the next day or two. Please do let me know what you all think!

[Petay1985]

nice progess fella, interesting use of a predator turret on the razorback too!

[Solun Decius]

Beautiful man, just beautiful!
I love the idea of having "pointless" models around with the army models, just for added character. I think it could add a lot to an army, although stuff like that usually gets scrapped because it's "more important" to finish the actual game miniatures. I hope you pull through with it though. The last photo with squad and tank looks amazing.

[Promethius]

Awesome work. I am sat here wondering how to make an entire squad with bullpop bolters!

[TheConverter15]

Very nice, one of the best marine armies I have seen by a mile Though we definately need a close up on the custom sternguards head, (the guy closest to the front in the most recent photo)

[Jonahmaul]

Just catching up on the PLOG and some brilliant stuff once again, this army is really impressive and I'm loving the extra character the snow theme is giving them

[ChaplainOrion]

This is some great stuff here. Looks amazing.

[Lew_b81]

Petay: Thanks man! The Predator turret really came out of necessity. It was back in the days when you could order individual sprues, so I needed everything for the conversion on one sprue.

Solun: Yeah I agree, pointless models are a lot of fun. Even though I usually forget to move them (those times I remember to take them out of the case).

Promethius: Ooh now that I'd like to see! I think they could easily sub for Sternguard.

TheConverter: Thanks! And there is a close up on the previous page.

Jonahmaul: I'm glad you like the snow. I wasn't sure if it would work properly, and I'm still not sure it's particularly necessary, but I think it provides a little contrast to the miniatures.

ChaplainOrion: Thank you!

__________________________________________________ ____

Just a quick update today. Thought I'd show the next squad before they receive their "treatment".



As always a lot of conversions, but I'll save the blow by blow for when I get the finished pictures up (very soon, I promise!).

Thanks again for all the comments!

[tcraigen]

Great work, the basing on these looks amazing.

[Jonahmaul]

Are you using the PVA/Bicarbonate snow method? I'm doing my marines on snow bases using this but figure I should get some on their legs as it doesn't look quite right them just standing on snow!

[tominator]

just missed you on monday. I got there as ben's lunch was meant to end and spent 5 mins banging on the door trying to get him to notice that a) i was waiting and b) he was late. Can't make thursday for a game but will pop in on way home from school and I'll bring a couple of my ogres that i've finished and a marine to show you. I've also got a couple of questions to ask you aswll. So hopefully see you on thursday.

Tom

[Lew_b81]

Tcraigen: Thanks!

Jonahmaul: No, I use Woodland Scenics snow flock with Woodland Scenics water effects and a little pva glue. Mix is altogether and slop it on, then sprinkle dry snow flock over the top before it sets.

Tom: I must have missed you yesterday, only managed to get down around 5 o' clock. Next time!

__________________________________________________ _________________

I managed to get in a game yesterday against a friend with some newly bought Tyranids. He made up an army list very quickly, but it had three Zoanthropes (individual), three Carnifexes (Carnifeces? All individual too), a Hive Tyrant, and 60 Hormagaunts with Toxin Sacs and Adrenal Glands. Ouch.
I managed to kill the Hive Tyrant in the very first turn (mostly lascannon sniping), but lost my Vindicator on turn two without doing any damage with it. A Scout squad got mauled by 20 Outflanking Hormagaunts (one survived to run off the board!), and four out of five Devestators died a heroic end from a charging Carnifex. In return, the Thunderfire, Master of the Forge, one Sternguard squad and the Terminators accounted for the entire Tyranid army. I did pretty badly with rolling dice, but had enough flamers to deal with Hormagaunts and enough lascannons to deal with Carnifexes. It was a kill points game, and by the end of turn four it was a wipeout - 10 kill points to 2.
Of particular note was one Sternguard squad that jumped out of its Razorback to shoot a Carnifex. They did a single wound to it, but in overshooting with the heavy flamer and flamer managed to kill 8 Hormagaunts and a Zoanthrope! They then got charged by the Carnifex, had a few die, and then the Techmarine Sergeant stepped up and squished the Carnifex's face with his servo arm.

So a victory to me! I do feel sorry for the Scouts - it was their first game fully-painted, and I sacrificed four of them for the good of the Chapter. Ho hum.

Alright, pictures for today! The Sternguard squad as it stands now:



All of them together, and some individual shots.



This guy's body and head are from the old Blood Angels Honour Guard Techmarine.



A Deathwatch Marine, because I couldn't resist. He's also the only one to be carrying a meltabomb and krak grenades alonside his special Bolter.



Legs from the Iron Hands squad released a few years back.



This guy is meant to be retreating back to his Razorback - the pouches are twisted to show movement. He's armed with a boarding-action mark boltgun - made from an extremely cut down Chaos Warrior shield.



This guy has proper Maximus armour, complete with panel lines along the side of the leg plates. Both of the heavy flamer Marines have larger left shoulder pads, to accommodate for the extra protection needed from the heat of the heavy flamer. Speaking of flamers, I like to make a little nozzle on the front of each flamer. Drilling out barrels on guns is fine, but doesn't look right on a flamer. I think this is a nice solution.



And finally the big boss himself. A lot of conversion work here. He also has his combi-flamer and servo arm built in. The backpack, arms and head are fairly obvious parts, but if anyone can guess what the rest is from I'll be impressed. I played it last night with the manager of my local, and it took him a good ten minutes!



So that's that. The army is currently in the cabinet in the Cheltenham store alongside my Ogres, so if anyone wants a close up, it's the easy task of just going there. Well, it's easy for me - it's only up the road!

[tominator]

i'm going to be in on monday from about 2ish til 4 so hopefully i can see you then. And those models are beautiful

[rev]

really like the deep crimson/purple of the boss - explain how you did it?!

[PowerfulFawn]

Really like the razorback interior you've done! I've thought about doing something similar for a hb turret using the baal pred sponsons..

Agree with rev too, beautiful rich red there.