Vampire Counts Army Project - Pt:2 Dire Wolves

Edna was angry, she was angry at her papa for scolding her infront of Sven. She was angry at her mother for not standing up for her, and she was angry at Sven for running home like a mut with his tail between his legs when her father had found them out by the barn. After the embarrassing encounter with her family she ran.  She started heading towards the shack by the lake. She knew no one had claimed ownership of it in several seasons and she would often go there during the summer just to unwind and get out of doing her chores. She could still hear her family yelling her name, it was just after dusk and she didn't have a lantern with her.  She knew the route well enough she thought.  After close to an hour of travel she started to have her doubts. The trail continued through the forest but she wasn't seeing any of the land marks or fields that told her of her destination. A slight breeze passed through the trees and on it came a smell of rotten meat. She started to turn around, and admit that maybe she will deal with her family's scolding over the darkness when she heard it. The growling of a dog. She picked up a fallen branch that was just off the trail and started to slowly walk back the way she came. The clouds which up to this point had kept the night dark started to thin allowing silver beams of light to give her a better view of the animal which had startled her.  Her heart pounding in her chest she looked back only to see nothing there was no dog, she was about to tell herself that she needs to stop letting the darkness get to her when the rotting smell blew past her again, this time it was almost overwhelming.  She took a few steps backwards and that's when she bumped into something.  It was those last few moments when she saw the glowing green flame in the eye sockets that used to hold the cunning eyes of a predator that Edna wished she had simply stayed home.

Across the lands of the Old World giant wolves roam the country side, these beasts almost as large as horses  prey on travelers and small farming villages. While large hunting parties are put together to destroy these beasts, the dark magic near Sylvania allows for no soul to rest for long before they dig themselves out of the pits the hunters bury them in. As they did in life, these newly risen Dire Wolves find the strongest beast to which will lead them, often being a Vampire.  

In times of battle Vampires command these monstrosities to run around the enemy's flanks to harass their artillery or find a weak flank to clash into.

Now that you have a little bit of an idea on what exactly Dire Wolves are in Warhammer, here is the set of models I have been working on for my army.

This was the unit, and where it was in completion when I started this project.

No basing beyond the stones, many portions of the wolves were not completely painted. ( I in general work on the 3 foot rule so often it if looks good far away I stop working on them. )

Since then I have put a few more coats of paint on these beasts, finished with the basing and even added some leaves which I have picked up to help add that "little extra" to my VC army.

Though its not much to tell from the images above I never said I was going to be completely re-doing these units.  I just wanted to polish them a little more.

I think it turned out rather acceptable. 

Let me know what you think, and thanks again for visiting.

Vampire Counts Army Project - Pt:1

Velcome back to my blog!  I vant to paint my vinatures!

That was terrible, I should be beaten for that.   As you can tell based on the title of this post, I'm aiming to finish my Vampire Counts army.

When I first started into the hobby I was pulled in with Warhammer 40k, but then the sleek looking skeleton models cam out from GW, and I fell in love with the Vampire Counts.  I have always enjoyed the myths that comes with vampires and werewolves. None of that  "sparkly" bullshit, but the kind that honestly hunted you for sport and fed on your fear as well as your life. So as they continued to build the range of models it continued to grab my interest.

It was when I picked up the starter box, and my friend picked up the dwarf starter that my drive into fantasy really began. So it is fitting that I'm going to take steps to finish this army and officially call it "Done".  I though that I would never actually reach that point, but with GW destroying the world and game that I have grown to enjoy for all these years I see more and more of the armies getting canceled. When I say canceled, I mean literally no longer making models for them.  I wanted a box of Brettonian Men-At-Arms because the theme of my army was to be an undead Brettonian feel.  I can't find sprues for Brettonians to save my life.   I have a box of Brett Knights and checking ebay they are going for $100 already.  I swear on I saw a website trying to sell 5 grail nights for $400.

I guess its true, its worth more when you can't get it anymore.
Thankfully my undead seem to be safe for now.  Though I need to finish my Dwarf army asap...

On to the stuff!

Here you can see the planned pile of things.  Last night I spent time taking each model out of my foam cases, and sorted them into groups that I can start to work on.

Skeleton's need to be finished, and based for the most part.
Worgs need to be based but are done.
Zombies need to be touched up and based
Ghouls need to be finished getting put together, based, primed and painted.
Corpse Cart needs to be based and detailed.
and the list goes on...

What I'm going to do is treat my blog as my own little check list of completion and also provide some fun information on the units and history of what they have done.

I will post updates and images of what I have gotten done, and then move to the next unit till everything is finalized.

I have some fun ideas, but I'm always open to suggestions so as we go through these posts please feel free to give me any ideas you can!

Thanks for taking time to read my blog.

2014 Hobby Challenge Lite

Below (slightly edited) is an email I sent out to a few people I know who love to hobby. Some of you reading this may think to yourself "Hey, I know that guy, and I also love to hobby. What gives? Where was my email?"    Well person who talks with the same voice I hear in my head, its simple.  I either don't have your email address, didn't think you would be terribly interested in it, or simply forgot. (Happens often to me).

Email below

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So this year I’m going to present a challenge for all of you.  A Simple, low requirement challenge that I think all of us can do to help us keep working on our forces and plan to play more games.

Each month of this year we will need to have something completed.  That is  Acquired / Built / Primed / Painted.

I know we are all busy with life so your monthly project requirements will be light.

We will have a minimum amounts of whatever you are working on but you can do way more if you want.

• One ten man squad of marines \ xenos (Or if you picked up the cheaper 5 man squad that.
• One ten man unit of Fantasy troops (i.e. 10 brettonian archers, or 10 skaven warriors)
• Two  Clam pack Hero / HQ choice options   (I put a minimum of 2 cuz… come on.  You can do 2 in a month)
• One 40k vehicle, or Fantasy Large model (think Giant spider or steam tank)
•  Any terrain  (but make it look gooooooood)

These are examples but you get the idea.  You are not required to go out and by new stuff for these monthly challenges, go through your stuff, organize it and figure out what you have.   1 month to get a 10 man troop choice done should be easy for us all to do.    You can do more though, just to show up your friends.  Jerk.

It will also keep our minds on our hobby a little more.

To start all you need to do is send me a picture of what you are starting with, and at the end of the month what you are ending with.   All of you have phones with cameras on it now.  #NoExcuses  Even if it’s a picture of a sprue.   All the pictures are going to go on my blog.  (This is a 2 fold resolution for me to keep writing btw).  I will simply refer to you by your first name (no details) unless you would prefer some kind of edgy pen name like “Magenta the Destroyer, demon of the dark”.  At which point I will do it and also ridicule you as much as possible.  But don’t let that stop you.

For whoever keeps up on it and shows the most progress in terms of things completed/attempted, and who seems to really be trying hard there may be a prize at the end of the year.

Let me know what you think, its near the end of the first month so if you can show me 1 model you can pump out in the last days I think we can accept Jan as a starter month. 

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Seems pretty simple hey?

I sent this out on the 16th, and have gotten a number of responses already that they are interested in doing it.  Only one image though.

Our first challenger is Tim one of my best gaming friends who submitted a group of Brittonian Bowmen.  He was already working on them and its a great way to get January into the bucket.

Tim's entry is a small unit of Brettonian Bowmen for Warhammer Fantasy Battle

My personal entry.  This is Gonk. Gonk is a Warhammer 40k, Ork "Boy". 

That is really that.

I'm expecting 4 possibly 5 more entries so I will be adding them as they come along.

If your interested in joining the fun message me and let me know. If you are unsure how to start I would love to help explain things.

Thanks for reading.

PROGRESS UPDATE  1/23/14

For right now I'm just going to update this post with more information and pictures as people submit them.

I have both another submission, and a mostly completed entry.

Jeff submitted an Ultramarine battle standard bearer.  Uh.."your arms off". 

I like that you are starting with a highly detailed single model to start off the year. There is no earning points for painting fast or slow. So go at your own pace

I on the other hand sat down tonight and cranked out Gonk.

Curse you wretched flash.   I didn't base him yet cuz I have no idea how I'm basing this army. I just wanted to get some experience painting green on green on green.

I went with yellow just cuz. Seemed to flow with the green skin well. Not sure what clan I'm going with though, any suggestions?  Yellow tends to be a pain in the ass to do. Orks can get away with "slopping" paint on though.

The skin was an Ork hide shade, then dry brushed Knarlock Green. then dry brushed Goblin Green, with a Thraka green wash.

Aright boys, lets do dis!

Update - 1/26

Our next entry was submitted by Michael "Da Warboss", who is submitting an Ork Warbiker mob.

He started painting them last week and as you can see, is no slouch in detail.

Git ova here litta 'hmie. I got sum'fin for yas.

I know, I'm working on my Ork Soccer hooligan speak, it will get better.  Now I feel my lone boy has been out-classed.  Only means i need to work harder now.

Update 1/29

My friend Ryan sent me some pictures of a Dark Angels bike sargent he just finished up.  Looking rather nice for someone who has only recently started his Warhammer addiction.

I have come to drive all over your rich mahogany!

Put me down said the Dark Angel, I do not wish to fall!

The second I get back on the road I'm going to cut down some mailboxes.

Yes, if you send multiple pictures I will post them with funny comments too.  I'm cool like that.

Keep up the good work guys, and remember send those pictures in.

The Warhammer Fantasy Campaign restart.

                Sorry for the delay in posting, not that a week is really a huge delay but still I know all 1 of you who subscribe to this desire to know how poorly I paint as well as how bad I am at updates.

That or you are just sitting there waiting for your other browser full of cat pictures to load.  Lets be honest here.

You couldn't say no if you tried.

Tim and I had been playing our previous campaign with 6 different armies each and 5 heroes that could gain experience as they won challenges and participated in battles. It helped us have a running theme to our battles. Also helped give our armies some character beyond their normal fluff.

Tim and I have taken the “experience charts” from a number of Games Workshops different books, and created our own leveling process with them.   All three armies we pick need to have 3 hero type characters.  Any 3 you want to choose but you are limited to those 3.

Well... technically you are doing it right.

As we play games, based on the actions of those games our heroes will get experience points. For every 10 experience points they gain one experience level, and get to role on a chart that give them a bonus to stats and combat abilities.  No one stat can ever be raised more than once.

Once a character gets 5 levels of experience, they have the option to forgo their bonus stats, and upgrade to a Lord level character ( yay promotions! ) 

I may come back and re-edit this post with the full detailed rules but right now this is the lay out.

Next will be the Battle report of Tim and I playing our Empire Vs Skaven.  Very close and fun Game.

Battle Report - Woodelves and Vampire Counts, and side projects.

     Small post today because I'm a bit behind on updating.  
     Tim and I did infact play a game on Saturday, but not only did I not remember to start recording or taking pictures until turn 5, but I was lazy in documenting what happened.
     What you need to really know is that Tim's Wood Elves put up a great defence against my Undead Hoard.  But in the end the Vampire Counts did prevail and put the Wood Elves out of particular ailment, which happened to be their lives.

The brave Glade Guard fire into the massed ranks of the undead.

The Massed Ranks of the undead don't care about arrows.

With my Naval Fleet completed, I started to work on my Malifaux models,  another small group of maybe 12 total, but this time its all individual models, meaning i can take more time with detail and less time with assembly line painting.  Its nice.

                                       



This is just a mini-update.  Will have another real post later on.

Showcase Danger Zone

Three posts in one day?  HolyCrapSnacks!

I'm trying to setup this blog with what I hope becomes some re-occuring post types.

The normal "look at me, I just painted a bunch of crap that no one other then like 3 people will see in real life" posts.

"Battle Reports"  Where I update the blog with one of my weekly games of warhammer with Tim.

Or what I'm going to call the "Show Case Danger Zone" where you get to see a paint job that either myself or someone else had done that is either very well painted or reaches the "Fucking Sweet" level.

This week we are going to showcase the Arachnarock Spider that was expertly painted by our good friend Drake.  I finally got around to purchasing this big bastard for my Orcs and Goblins army as a centerpiece.
I was showing it to Drake as I was finishing the assembly and he seemed smitten with it and offered to give it a paint job.   As I realized he was trying to take away my opportunity to show everyone how awesome I could paint, I surprised him by practically throwing the critter at him.

"Hey baby, nice tuffit, you got any extra curds or whey? I just need my fix. Last time, I promise."

 

The rampaging spider destroyed most of the 7'th fleet moments later.

The spider was arrested an hour later after trying to flash an undercover police officer.

That is all there is tonight.  Tomorrow we will go over why planning to finishing painting projects the same weekend you are going to try and potty train your daughter is most likely a really bad idea.