WIP: Horus Heresy Dark Angels Praetor in Cataphractii Armor - Part 2

Just a short post today to share some small progress on the Cataphractii Praetor.  The black armor has been highlighted, which give some definition to the baroque details.

I think I'm finally falling into a groove with the edge highlighting. Practice makes perfect as they say - though I'm far from perfect at this point, and still quite slow at it.

The chainmail and other metal bits have been highlighted as well using Vallejo Steel. Still gotta paint that pistol though. Not sure why I'm holding off on that honestly.  It has sort of become a thing at this point.

He's a fierce looking dude, no doubt.  I'll get that pistol done over the next session.  In fact, I hope to post this guy as DONE by the end of the week.  Check back later to see if I do.

Cheers and Happy Gaming!

WIP: Horus Heresy Dark Angels Praetor in Cataphractii Armor

Greetings,

Today, I'm sharing progress on my next Heresy-era Dark Angels character; the recent Forge World Praetor in Cataphractii Terminator Armor.  This model is another great sculpt from the Forge World team and has been every bit a pleasure to paint.  Back in December, he looked like this when I shared him along with the other characters I had on deck at the time.

After a couple more sessions, the model has really come to life.  After some simple paintwork on the base, I attached the model and continued on with the project. This model is based to match the prior Praetor in power armor as well as the rest of my growing First Legion force.

The whites were painted in using GW White Scar while the trim and other metal details were given a coat of Vallejo Oily Steel.  For reasons, I have not yet put much effort into the pistol, other than painting and highlighting the wing icon.  Vallejo Brass was used for the sword hilt and spike crown.  P3 Menoth White was used on the shin scroll work. Reds, Golds, and scrolls got a pin wash of GW Agrax Earthshade.  The white is shaded with thinned Nuln Oil (aprox. 3:1 Lamiam Medium to Nuln Oil) while the metals got straight Nuln Oil.

I decided to paint brown leather under the chainmail hanging below the shoulder armor, using the same formula as pistol holsters and other equipment in the army.  The sword hilt was painted with P3 Sanguine Base and GW Spiritstone Red technical paint was painted over Vallejo Steel for the gems in the sword hilt.

Here's a quick look at the back of the model prior to final assembly.  Enough detail has been painted to allow the cape to be attached without hindering future painting of anything that can still be seen under it.

Here the model can be seen with head and cape attached.  The head was painted separately while glued to a wire as shown a couple pics above. This approach allows you to get good coverage and detail on it before cementing into the armor where it would otherwise be hard to reach in spots.  I opted for a black and white quartering of the shield hanging from the left pauldron. I also brought in the same red stripe I used on the other Praetor for the loin cloth. To be fair, this stripe comes from the Forge World example and is also featured in relief on the back of the cape, shown below. SO I'll take no artistic credit for the choice. :)

Some odd highlights have been picked out here and there, but there is much left to do.  He's already a pretty crazy looking dude.  The sword is such a great feature for a Dark Angels character.  Other characters bearing swords are going to envy this blade.

So, a little over a week into the new year and I have close to two completed characters for my Dark Angels Horus Heresy force. I hope to move onto the Blackstone Fortress models soon, but I dunno.  Squaduary will most certainly see a 10 string Breacher Seige squad painted....then either a Legio Tempestus Warlord titan for AT or a Dark Angels Leviathan Dreadnought for #MonsterMarch4.

Might has well use the remainder of January to finish this model and get as much progress as possible on the remaining characters I started in December. Time will tell.

Thanks for dropping by.

Cheers and Happy Gaming!

WIP: Horus Heresy Dark Angels Praetor - TO DONE

Greetings and welcome back to 262Krieg.  In and around assembling mini Warlord titan weapons, I managed to complete the Dark Angels Praetor that had been started among other characters in December of last year. Looking at what is coming up this year for the 1st Legion, it couldn't come at a better time. This post is perhaps a bit heavy on pics so scroll to the end if you want to skip to the finished photo shoot.

Since I last shared this project, the sword hilt was painted and additional highlights were painted in here and there.  I'll admit to being a bit scattered with this project.  I did not follow any strict painting methodology or process but rather hopped about a bit from area to area has inspiration moved me.

The base received some additional spot shading with GW Athonian Camoshade and Biel-Tan Green to add an organic look and break up the browns.  The white areas on the model got additional highlights to clean them up a bit from the initial shading as well.

The highlights cleaned up the cape a bit.  I want the material a bit dingy here.  This fella isn't fresh from the parade ground after all.  He's been serving faithfully on the front lines.  Metal areas have been highlighted using Vallejo steel, picking out rivets and edges alike.

After some thought, I decided to freehand some red trim around the back of the cape. Some additional ham-fisted glazing and shading went into cleaning up the cape further aiming for a dingy-bit-not-too-crappy look. Also, the black armor has been highlighted here.

I have named this Terran, Praetor Mihr.  His great-sword has been given red jewels in the hilt, which has been highlighted as well.  The power blade rests in his grip inactive, so no blue shading or other power blade techniques have been used here.  At this point the project was complete and so received it's ceremonial coat of Model Masters Lusterless Flat Lacquer.

A big seal-o-done and we're off to the next project.   This model was a real pleasure to paint, and now with the Inner Circle Knights Cenobium announced, I'll move on to complete the Praetor in cataphractii war plate, I think.  Here are the final photo booth shots.

Cheers and Happy Gaming!

On the Workbench [January] - AT Warlord Titan Paired Weapons

Forge World recently released the missing shoulder mounted weapon options for Warlord Titans so I had to pick up the set to continue the collection for my Legio Tempestus force for Adeptus Titanicus.

While nowhere as impressive as their 28mm cousins, these are still nicely detailed resin kits in their own right. No warping to be heated and straightened at all and everything assembled very cleanly with no filing, filling, or fiddling required.  If I had a complaint, it would be that there was a decent amount mold gates and flash cleanup to be done prior to assembly.  But that is par for the course, and no big deal when working with resin.

The Paired Gatling Blasters were very decent to assemble with straight barrels (a two part assembly).  Lots of careful cleanup was required to remove flash between the barrels, so be warned.  As seen in the photo above, all options have a recessed magnet socket and I have magnetized them all for my existing Warlord as shown below.

Warlord Titan Ascraeus Magnificat cutting a fine (if possibly unbalanced) figure with the paired Gatling Blasters.

The Paired Turbo Laser Destructors were even easier to assemble.  Similar flash issued between barrels, but no warping was evident. It is very cool to have the magnet sockets so one does not have to take knife or drill to these small resin parts to make a socket by hand.

The parts click right onto the model and seat well on the shoulders.

Ascraeus Magnificat once again models the new weapon option for scale. Gladius Noctis lies resentful in its box.  While its completed (and magnetized) torso was used to establish polarity for the magnets during the build process, it didn't make the photo shoot.  I'm hoping to get paint on it as part of #MonsterMarch4...but there is also a Dark Angels Leviathan waiting in it's box..

Last up, we have the paired Vulcan Mega-Bolters.

The Mega-Bolters were the easiest to clean and assemble. Basically just cutting off the gates and cleaning up after.  The 5-minute 2-part epoxy worked wonders and these weapon options dried rock solid.  The epoxy holds the magnets very well too...just be prepared for patience.  Personally, I take the time to enjoy a fine beverage and reflect on my hobby kingdom while the epoxy dries.  5 minutes really isn't that long...

A somewhat less daunting look for the Warlord, but no less violent to the enemy.

Thanks for stopping by.  I hope my showcase of these assembled weapon options helps someone out there make the call to pick some up to round out the kit for their Warlords.  The sculpts look great and should add a lot of enjoyment and variety to future games.  Heck, maybe one day I'll actually play a game myself and find out!  LOL.

That's it for now.

Cheers and Happy Gaming!

WIP: Horus Heresy Dark Angels Characters - Part 4 - Happy New Year!

image by freeimageslive.co.uk - christmashat

Happy New Year and welcome to 2020 on 262Krieg.  The 2019/2020 gaming season is in full swing here after a brief holiday hiatus.  Lots of family fun was had with plenty of time to recharge the hobby batteries for the new year.

With the Holidays behind me, I sat back down to continue work on the heresy era Dark Angels characters I started in December.  This project started out as a batch painting exercise, but I quickly realized that I'd have to go one-on-one with these guys to get them painted well.  So I set asside the other characters for now and got to work completing the new(ish) Legion Praetor from Forge World.

The custom cork base got a coat of Vallejo Khaki Brown (71.024) and a wash of GW Agrax Earthshade.  Much more will go on here, but for now this was enough to prep it for final assembly.  Once the wash had dried, the model was pulled from its cork painting handle and pinned to the base using 5-minute two-part epoxy. The backpack was also attached at this point while I had mixed epoxy at hand.

When complete, I will have a very cool character to lead the force into battle. I love how the reds and whites pop against the black armor.  While I originally felt the Forge Wold paint jobs looked a bit too 40K, it's growing on me and I'm applying my own bit of 30k darkness to it.

The whites have been shaded with a couple coats of a 4:1 mix of GW Lamiam Medium and Nuln Oil.  It's pretty murky at this point, but I'll bring up the highlights in white as I go along so in the end it should all work out.  Some grime will also be shaded along the hem at some point as I weather the base and legs of the model. Straight GW Nuln Oil went over all the steel/metal bits and the reds.

Lots of highlighting and some more detail work (especially on the sword hilt) still to do, but this model is slowly crawling out of the "oh boy, what have I done now" phase and into the "wow, not too shabby!' phase.  Even the checkers are growing on me enough that I will likely free hand more on the vambraces.

It's going to be a busy hobby year.  I played some Blackstone Fortress over the holiday and have since primed the original set of characters.  I have an assembled Warlord Titan for Adeptus Titanicus to complete in Tempestus colors, and a host of AT scale knights as well that I plan to paint in the colors of House Taranis. There are many pre-heresy Dark Angels models waiting in the wings as well (the new Leviathan!) and a host of Blades of Vengeance Primaris space marines.

I'm now torn on the Primaris project and it awaits more from GW on where Dark Angels are headed once the new book(s) for the Psychic Awakening are out.  The Dark Angels are my original marine army going back to late 3rd edition (I started in 2nd with Space Orks) and if they now accept (and indeed embrace) their Primaris brethren, then I really don't need to paint my existing host as Blades of Vengeance after all, other then for some variety.  I was originally following he early fluff that had the Dark Angels keeping the Primaris at arms length.

Fortunately, I have many, many things to paint and model on while I wait to see where I want the Primaris models to go.  Expect Blackstone Fortress character models here next (at least a couple).  Possibly before I complete all of the Pre-Heresy Dark Angels characters.  Then I'm looking ahead to possibilities for Squaduary2020 and #MonsterMarch4 should the traditions carry on.

That's it for now.  Hope everyone had a great New Year's celebrations and I look forward to reading and seeing all the hobby goodness from folks that the new year has to bring!

Cheers and Happy Gaming!