Horus Heresy 30k Briscon Trip Report: Dark Mechanicum Ascendent and finally fully painted!

The Briscon 30k event has come and gone! 2 days of a narrative 30k event run by the lads at Pubhammer Brisbane. I decided to attend this event right at the last minute and really only had about a week and a half to list crunch and then paint and assemble what I was going to take. I settled on a my Dark Mechanicus as they are the army I had been working on for a while and then decided to back away from reductor or cybernetica lists for something different. 

 

As you can see in the pic I still brought a fairly mean force. Watching some of the guys attending post on various social media the armies they were prepping was an indication of our strong QLD meta with lots of big transports and LOW choices.

This was the list I took in the end:

++ The Age of Darkness (Mechanicum: Taghmata Army List) [2500pts] ++

-Magos Prime: Abeyant, Archmagos Prime, Chainfist, Cortex Controller, Cyber-familiar, 4x Cyber-occularis, Jet Pack, Malagra, Paragon Blade, Rad Furnace, Rad Grenades

-Secutarii Hoplite Phalanx: Arc Lance, Kyropatris field generator, Mag-inverter Shield, 19x Secutarii Hoplite, Secutarii war plate

Secutarii Alpha: Arc Lance

Triaros Armoured Conveyor: Blessed Autosimulacra, Smoke Launchers

-Thallax Cohort : Ferrox, 3x Heavy Chainblade, 3x Thallax

-Thallax Cohort : Ferrox, 3x Heavy Chainblade, 3x Thallax

-Ursarax Cohort: 3x Power Fist, 6x Ursara

-Vultarax Stratos-automata [165pts]

-Vultarax Stratos-automata [165pts]

-Myrmidon Destructors: 2x Myrmidon Destructor, 2x Volkite Culverin,

Myrmidon Lord, Irradiation Engine

Legio: Taghmata Omnissiah

-Mechanicum Indentured Knight Atrapos

The Vultarax were a new unit for me as I had never had them painted for a game until now so it was a crash course on using them and the Hoplites I had only used very sparingly in Zone Mortalis. As it turned out both of those units are crushingly mean when used correctly.  I think in any future games I will take 10man Hoplites and 1 Vultarax just for fairness sake.

The event was narrative based so it was Traitors Vs Loyalist and you organized your own opponents on the day. While we had set missions it was a very chill and laid back atmosphere and everyone ran with that theme the whole event. At the end of the event I had walked away with 1 draw and 4 wins and top spot. Best painted went to Michael from Eye of Horus podcast fame. Traitors won overall and the results uploaded into the AUS30k site for continued campaign tracking. Big shout out to the Pub-hammer lads for organizing and running a very sucessful and smooth event. 

Enjoy some pics of the even/armies and if you are in Brisbane next year roll over and check out Briscon for sure.

 

And as a bonus here is some shots of the INSANE Lord of the Rings Table that happened on the last day!

 

Horus Heresy 30k Projects, Mechanicus and getting ready for Briscon : Dark Mechanicus Painting Part 4 + Painting a Knight Atrapos in 2 Days.

Briscon is quickly approaching and Operation Molten Storm 30k event with it! A narrative 2 day 30k event with 5 games played and lots of cool dudes looking to roll dice with other cool dudes. Army lists are 2.5k with a optional LOW slot............. shit........ I need a LOW....... a Dark Mechanicus LOW. I kind of have a half painted Chaos Knight, but that just doesn't feel mean enough, how about that Knight Atrapos I have sitting unpainted on my shelf with less than 5 days to go to the event and more than half my infantry still to be painted and based as well?

Challenge Accepted!

So I had a long weekend in hand and a goal, lets get to this. Army scheme is carried over with beaten brass/copper with slick black stripes or face plates to give it a slightly more sinister look. I also punched out the primary painting of some Vultarax as well.

 Vultarax with a quick glossy black stripe ties them to the theme of the rest of the army, I was slack and haven't set up my new airbrush kit since moving so just did the stripe with some tape and brushwork.

Hammered out the main paint job on a Triarios as well.

 Rebased and primarily finished the Usarax squad, just needs decals now

Same story on the Thallax squads, only decals to go!

 Hoplites are decal ready as well, they will be traveling in the Triarios

And a quick progress shot of the Mad Malagra Magos Coatl + his four themed Cyber-Occularis, also the Myrmidons are like 80% finished.

So now onto how I did the Atrapos in 2 days..... I literally woke up on the weekend before Briscon and just had to take him in the army nothing less would suffice. As with all Knight Painting you should start by base coating the skeleton and armor plates separately. This allows for a much tidier painting routine and better access and coverage for the model. I base coated him silver and then gave that silver a heavy black wash followed by a spot wash of brown to dirty him up some.

 The I hit all the panels with 2 coats of bronze to get an even coverage.

 The bronze plates then got a heavy wash of nuln oil and started on the green gun sections.

 Black stripe was done in the same manner as the Vultarax, painters tape and brush work.

 Weathering on the bronze is done with a old scruffy brush and some silver, I tried to make it look like the scrapes are legit wear and tear. Also started highlighting the green sections and glossed up the black stripes.

 Did up a nuclear winter themed base with a couple of ruins and skulls scattered around, no the most striking base but fits in with the rest of the force and was very quick to get done in a limited time frame!

So there you go, 2 days to the basics of a Knight Atrapos and most of my 2500 worth of Dark Mech! The Atrapos has a huge amount of detail yet to complete but this was all about getting him table top ready. Once the event is over I will have plenty on time to go back and flesh out the cabling, read panel detail and even the pilots seat of the interior. I will try and get some decent pics of the whole force together come event day and do a quick write up of the whole event plus pics galore of all the armies present!

Horus Heresy 30k Projects, Mechanicum and Raven Guard: Dark Mechanicum Legio Cybernetica Painting Part 3 and Part 1 Raven Guard

My love for killer robots is unending and as such I have got my hands on some new addition to my Dark Mechanicum 30k army.

I couldn't help myself and with a cheeky Myrmidon Destroyer unit for a solid addition to my Zone Mortalis lists, also a Macrotek with some servitors for cheap flamers and a Grav imploder.

The Knight Atrapos is a monster and will fit in very well as the lord of war choice for larger games and the new Vultarax Stratos-Automata is a vehicle hunting, haywire spitting drone of violence.

On the burner as well is an idea for a small 1250point 30k Raven Guard list. One of the biggest things I have learned about ZM games is mobility is king. The ability to forward deploy via infiltrate, scout or outflank is a massive game changer in ZM. Lots of first time players of ZM will bring very heavy slow units that only have a few counter but then due to the objective based nature of the majority of missions find themselves left out in no mans land or out of the action due to slow movement and the inability to quickly redeploy.

  

My idea for a Raven Guard paint scheme comes from the actual bird itself, the plumage of Ravens looks pure black from a distance but up close you will see they have a purple iridescent sheen to them. I wanted to try and replicate this somewhat on the actual marine models to try and move away from a pure black scheme. I achieved this by basing the model silver, then 2 coats of purple wash and then 2 coats of black wash. This was a quick and dirty test model but the effect did come through! with the static photos its hard to tell, but in reality on the table it looks black until a light source hits it and then the iridescent purple sheen shows through! Pretty happy and will now look at refining the process and mass producing a squad or two.

 

With Raven Guard you get all your infantry infiltrating and units such a vets or Mor Deythan squads coming with scout on top of that. In light I want to run a force with the theme of ship to ship infiltration or vacuum combat, think of this army as Raven Guard who conduct sabotage and infiltration of space stations, ships and the like in the cold vacuum of space but in a sneaky fashion. So lots of more heavy armour marks as opposed to the Mk4 to Mk6 you see most Raven Guard forces in and a heavy core of void hardened Mk3 for durability and space combat.

AOS Death Malignant and Nighthaunt Army Project Part 2: "Spooksville"

Finished up a solid chunk of the Malignant army I was painting up, even got a bunch of games in with it and they performed really well. The addition of the Mourngul was the right move as it allows me to munch through tougher units or break down smaller ones easily.

Mourgul got the same painting treatment as the rest of the force. Brown base, orange and then yellow shading on the raised areas/arms and then black sprayed in the recesses.

 This was the hit with a very heavy wash of green to bring out the yellows into the fluro color you see below. Due to the size of the model some areas needed a second coat of green wash

After the green wash settled bright highlights via dry brushing were applied to make it pop

The res of the army got a basic brown mud base with some static grass tufts as well. 

All done! now to have some more games, get bored, sell the lot and pick another project!...............send help...........I have army painting issues!

Death Guard Horus Heresy 30k Project: Part 2, Weathering Heights

New post for the new year! I finished weathering and painting for my nascent Death Guard 30k Heresy force. Painting these guys has been an absolute treat and hence the quick completion time for once. Nothing like smashing out the core troops and a HQ so you can move on to the fun toys next.

The weathering was always going to be the sticky part of this paint scheme, I tried a few different colors and weathering styles on some test models and was happiest with a simple rhinox hide first dabbed on spots and likely wear areas followed up by a very small detailed brush with leadbelcher. I tried to keep with the old style of highlighting the larger rhinox hide splotches to make them more 3d with the bare metal scratched look. I also used the leadbelcher to highlight the bronze trims on all the marines to make them look a bit more beaten and worn as well.

So yeah there you go, 20 tac marines and a HQ selection complete apart from transfers which I will get done when more of the force is complete. Time to get in some sneaky Zone Mortalis games I think!

Death Guard Horus Heresy 30k Project: Part 1 "What Paint Scheme?"

New year incoming so it feels like just the right time for a new project! Enter a Death Guard 30k Army to the list of things I start and have trouble finishing then! I will be building this force up to a 3k point all kitting up to use the Sacrificial Traitor Right of War, so lots of filthy expendable cultists and all the legion assets outflanking for some random fun. I have 3 Contemptor dreads and a leviathan as well for some added outflanking punch. Those will come later once I get the paint scheme down pat.

I got my hands on a pretty cheap Burning of Prospero boxed set and with 30 mark 3 marines to play around with plus my assorted left over bits and pieces from a few other projects I embarked on a 30k Death Guard test painting session.

I started with the standard base coating via an airbrush, Brown followed by a zenith grey highlight and then of course a strong white zenith highlight. This was all then heavily washed with Sepia Brown. After the Sepia was dry I gave each model a vigorous drybrushing of Pallid Wych Flesh. 

The green I was looking for the shoulder/legion marking was very much a departure from the usual drab washed out colors many others typically choose for 30k and even 40k Death Guard. I wanted something that would stand out and look particularly infectious and virulent, I ended up using Warp Stone followed with a green wash and then a thinned follow up coat of warpstone to get the desired green I was chasing.

I am still testing a weathering method/color I am happy with and will report back soon!

AOS Death Malignant and Nighthaunt Army Project Part 1: "Spooky Spooks"

So I have caught the AOS bug pretty hardcore and so has my local club, we are all hell for leather putting together 1000 point matched play armies as fast as our spare time and wallets will allow. I love the start collecting boxes Games Workshop keeps releasing not only are thy great value but they have some of the coolest sculpts and basic starter armies for most of the factions. I used to have a Vampire Counts force a while ago and really wanted to get into the whole Death faction.

Now with most of my projects I like to keep to a theme and build something you don't see on the table much or if at all. While Death did recently get the Flesh-Eater Courts update and as such has many more options available for a pure court army I was drawn to the much more restricted Nighthaunts with their heavy spectral and ghost themed units. After having play on the AOS app and in the newly release battlescribe update I was able to pin down a couple of quick 1000pt lists based purely on Nighthaunt units and purchased one of the new Malignant Starter sets and some extra units from my favorite Australian online retailer www.emeraldhobbies.com.au (free shipping over $100 and usually 20% discount is amazing).

The theme for the army was originally going to be Nighthaunts stranded in Aqshy the realm of fire and do them up all flame and fire like, but after struggling with the fire paint scheme I decided to go the quick and easy route and use the old ork flesh painting trick and wash the bright yellow base coat with green wash for instant fluro green spooky look. It worked thankfully!

This pic is about half way through the dry brushing stage, Once I have got the airbrushed base shading down I drybrush all the yellow areas several times to get a nice bright contrast going that will really pop when the green wash goes over it. 

I have a lot of work still to do on each model even after the green wash but you can defiantly see the theme pull through well now with the full on ghost/spirit look I was chasing. The whole army needs to feel insubstantial and ethereal and the painting as well as the models chosen to fill out the list should provide that. I have a Mourngul ordered and on its way from FW and can't wait to get that beast assembled and painted up ASAP!