Legion’s Bobperialis

Well there has been a bit of a pause since last update, not because I have not been busy but……..bloody small Infantry. As with my earlier ACW epic project this got a bit tedious when doing the Marine Infantry , particularly as I was working with various themes of black … Not helped by the fact I had 2x starter boxes !

Now I even tried to break up monotony by doing them in groups , on the sprues for ease, clipping and basing each group as I went along .

1st I did the Misslie Marines, which I did in GW Basilicum grey , and lack washed post wpns being picked out, Felt this left them too gray , though some of the colour plates of Crusade era Raven Gaurd show them as more Grey than Black .

I then went for the Terminators, and actually had fun with these as found a reference to the Deliverers a Raven Guard unit made of old Earth vets,and had red armour so Broke these up with 2x bases in Red and 2x in Black

The Deliverers were dond in GW Gryp hound Orange

The others this time I went for Black Templar and found it a bit dark so had to dry brush!!!!!

I then tried mixing 50/50 for the Assault Marines, hurrah got it, dark enough with a resonable amount of shading .

These were done as were the Plasma Marines

Leaving the command figures, I then did the tactical Marines,a sprue at a time ,ka s I found I was going cross eyed if tried any more!

This though allowed me to do a spue of Veterens to break it up and, allowed for vet bases worth.

The command were then done, with me doing a little bit of variation for the Apothocaries, varying how much white was on them.

The standards had a few spare Raven guard decals put on them .

I have finally begun my Infantry with the Dreadnoughts, basically as they have to be built and can be individually based.

The main difference in the scheme to the one described for the Tanks is I used GW Basilicum Grey for the base colour as I thought it wold give a more even coat than did the thinned out Black Templar.

I think you can see now why I went for the stone/Concrete effect for the bases as it makes the figures pop, plus as can be seen , it blends in nicely with Desert Hexon Tiles.

And noe I have actually started on some of the Core units,  beginning with the Marine Tanks.

Being Raven Guard they are never going to be the flashy colours of many of the other Legions , plus I give my self a bit of a rod for my back fir an army that is basically Black.

Here are the 1st units of armour, sitting on one my Desert Hexon tiles.

I learned sometime ago  that in fact black is often best emphasised by the lack of actual Black.

So as with the Aeronautica units I started with thinned GW Black Templar over a Grey Seer Primer.

I lightly dry brushed Corvus White over the model.

Block painted the metallics and Tracks using Speed Paints Broadsword Silver

Then I gave whole Model a GW Nuln Oil Wash.

Odd Side panels were block painted GW Corax White , and again the model was given a light dry brush with the same.

Exhausts and laser barrels were then gone over with Speedpaints Zealots Yellow.

The models at the end of painting looked (to me) a bit darker, but use of AK Ultra Matt, seemed to dull it down to the effect above.

Now for the Warlord.

Now you mat be wondering why the base colour scheme, is so similar to much of the Titans livery, and as such doesn’t give much contrast. For which There is a couple of reasons:

1. I wanted to get away from the classic Dark Gothic look, as I have a box of 10mm buildings, which I’m planning to use and will be painting up to match some nice Resin Battletech buildings I already have ( plus boxes of stuff already done)
2. The light Concrete/stone effect fits in with my Desert Hexon Terrain Should make my core Raven Guard force stand out l, which they wouldn’t have on the Classic Gothic .

The very Final touch was adding odd bits of Broken Titans, using bits left over from boxes, with offcuts of Mdf.

Finally again to break them up and add a bit if colouring the form of Warlords Battlefields and Basing , Summer Undergrowth Clump Folliage, which I know may not fit in with Dark Future, but this is 30k, and early in campaign and bits of life are still hanging on.

Above the Maniple as a whole , to give you sone idea of my pile of shame, the number above can be doubled, in models to be built

Next week should actually have some core units done.

You’d think with earlier photo , this update would have come rapidly after the Knights update, but I had started the Warlord, and wanted to await its completion   plus last week my Xmas bug, went into overdrive, turning into a major chest infection,  so was limited on hobby time, as any attempt to do anything,  would result in increasingly worse coughing fits.

Anyway here they are

I think I mentioned before that originally created my own Legio Scheme House Mercia, which I wasn’t totally happy with, plus it was too close to how I was going to be doing my Raven Guard.

So I chose Legio Aturus, 1stly it was a legio that often worked with the Guard plus it had a very different Red and Cream Livery.

I’d already had success with the Red on  my Knights  , though wasn’t sure about the cream.

The basic part of the Paint Job followed that of the Knights, on both models the raised nature of the detail aided in making the base colours fairly easy.

The main work on these was the Cream. Now the official artwork showed it a stained effect and I wanted to emulate that as best I could.

1) So I gave those a base coat of GW Wraithbone base paint,

2) when it had dried I went over the central areas with an MP paints Cream, which was slightly lighter.

3) I then gave areas a thinned out Gw Sepia wash.

4) I then went around the edges where any detail was again this time with undiluted Sepia, to shade and stain the edges, plus on the Warlord odd splodges for staining ( Think GW suggests using Agrax Earthshade,  but I’d seen some Aussie Group on YouTube use above method on the official buildings and thought I’d try it.

The title of this will only make sense to people of certain age !

My next unit as see previously was to build an finish all the little Imperial Knights in my pile of shame. Now originally I done them as House Terryn , which is the house on the box and most of art for the bigger brothers.

I wanted  a loyalist scheme quicker to do so on perusing the Loyalist Titanicus looke for Knightly Houses associated with the Raven Guard and found  House Col’Khak’ which for ease is Kojak , hence entry title . This house is A Mecanicum house which alos makes it differ from previous house painted.

It was also fairly easy and quick to paint :

Basic coat of Army Painters Chain mail ,

Nuln oil wash

Dry Brush with Army Painter Shining Silver

( this did all the metallic’s particularly the metal decoration on the armour panals )

Red bits done with  GW  Gryph Hound Orange Contast

(gave nice metallic red finish)

Black Bits GW Black Templar Contrast thiine to 75%

Odd bits of exhaust then given a bit of Sephia Wash for a copper/Bronze effect and pretty much done

The bases were covered with odd bits of MDF offcuts from various models to represent small walls and concrete walkways,

Parts of the basw were given a coat or Valleyo textured paint.

All above was coated in Gw Wraithbone ,

Textured bits got a GW agfaros Dunes coat

The raised bits were given a sepia Wash

and the Tarmac was the base texture of base with a coat of Gray Seer Contast

All were then dry brushed Wraithbone and a fine dry brush or Corex White .

The one thing I hadnt got for the House Terryn Force was a Porcupino (I think thats what its called) Knight , so that was done in a similar way to above , using mainly Tallasar Blue , the fine metal work being over done with eithr Sepia Wash or Speedpaints Zealot Yellow .

Finally I used 2 different Vanishs, I used Vallejo Matt on the Models as I wantedca slightly gloss metallic Finish  .But used AK Ultra Matt for the bases.

Well it may be wondered were are the core units, I somehow managed to get a starter box on release date, but anything else has been like getting Rocking Horse Shit. Coupled with that I’ve had emergency hospital visits, Xmas and Xmas Covid, so actually building stuff has been slow going…. .

Now having already built an airwing capable of blowing most Starter Armies into Rabbit droppings, I decided to know go through my other pile of shame, Adeptus Titanicus, and the huge box of unopened Kit brought ages ago ( bit daunting when realised best part of £400 sitting untouched. Now I had got some Knights and Titans Finished but although the former I was happy with I  the House Terryn Scheme I wasn’t happy at my attempt at my own Legion. Again I had gone with a predominantly Black Scheme, but now with LI I wanted something a bit different  and easier to paint.

I will do a fuller breakdown of schemes chosen and how zi did it later, but here are a couple of photos of the Knights and 1st Titans , with decals curing pre varnish.

Well it’s my favourite legion and in the Spirit of doing it the wrong way round, again I began with Aeronautica units.

I had previously on managed to Finish One Flight of Xyphons  which were done in more of .40k scheme, though it works for pre Dropsite massacre Crusade.

Above and the following recently completed were all done the same way. Black coloured models  are really more shades of grey with shadow for best effect.

So GW Grey Seer base

GW Black Templar Contrast over the top, tend to thin to about 75% as its easier to darken model with Nuln Oil if not dark enough.

Them dry brush with an MP paints mid Grey to add to shading.

Then a very light Corvus White dry brush over top.

Then use Army Painter Enchanted Steel for Metallics   with a Nuln oil wah to add to shading.

The next units done were the partly done Thunderhawk and Fire Raptors, the Former had been nearly finished for Aeronautica   so is more Crusade era , where everything late was left more monotone  for post the Dropsite massacre.

Now that was all my already purchased air contingent done, but I found my Local Warhammer store still had old Aeronautica stock in the stock room, so more Stormeagles, Fire Raptors and Valkyries brought ( I know the later and Vulture are not stated in base rule book but they will be added)