Warhammer 40k

[The Feline Solution 2]

hooked tips

Used to be the bane of my existance for as long as i used cheap brushes (though the standard GW shit certainly wasn't cheap from a monetary standpoint), became a non-issue once i started using high-quality brushes. If your brushes are cheap you can try an old "trick" to get a sharp point again: Get a mug with hot water (like out of the kettle hot but not boiling) and dip in the bristles or rather fully immerse them for about 10 seconds, take the brush out and roll the bristles into a fine tip (use your mouth or the ball of your thumb). It's hell on the bristles, the hooked tip will form over time again but you can get a bit more action out of a brush that would be unusable otherwise. I am not too sure if it works with synthetics, it works with GW/real-hair brushes. Obvisouly never do this with high-quality and expensive brushes.

 

[Judge Dredd]

I for one believe making your own bases is 99% of the fun. Depending on how many you have to make, it might just be cheaper to pick up milliputt, green stuff, astrogranite equivalent, etc.

I liked the idea of clear PVC bases, but that's a whole other rabbit hole.

I'm tempted to put more effort into my Knight bases, because there's two of them. For my infantry I have over 100 models if you count just the WGA kits. and >220 if you add Northstar to that count. Though practically speaking, 3 units of 10 is enough to make an "army".

Urban bases are fun because you can get a lot for very little. Some grey with the occasional brick, litter, or road marking. Green flock used to be the "universal" base as most battles back in 3rd were either open green fields or urban ruins.

Thinking about it. I often left them blank due to indecision.

 

[MazonLabs Recruitment Rep]

I use really fine/tiny rocks from my driveway. I'm a cheapskate.

 

[Love Machine]

I use really fine/tiny rocks from my driveway. I'm a cheapskate.

If it works, it works. Thats where i find like... little sticks and shit.

 

[Mr Clark]

I have printed my bases so far. When I can be arsed I'll do some Baal desert with nid corpses for my Blood Angels, that needs texture paste, cork and a box or two of nids.

But bases are where you get to be creative. Yeah, my Custodes are at the Imperial Palace, where else do you think they would be? My EC? On some nice white and pink marble display trays because showing off is very EC.

If you dont care, you dont care but they are how you tell the story of "Your Guys".

 

[p1138]

There's of course simple ways to do bases. Sand and cat litter painted and then drubrushed can be anything from urban rubble to a desert depending on if you throw in a couple bits of paperclip and a plastic runner cut into bricks, or a desert shithole if you paint it yellowish and add some desert looking shit like animal skulls or dried out plant tufts.

But the larger bases like the knights? That's where you get to actually put in some terrain, puddles, piles of sandbags, mangled sections of barbed wire, busted tank defenses, sections of road with markings, toppled trees, enough plants to look like the floor of a jungle, severed limbs, smashed helmets and gear, etc.

Air dry clay from the craft store, shit from the lawn(just dry it in the oven and make sure you seal it in glue or something), leftover bits from other projects, sprue you can whittle into anything, just pick something and go wild. Any dumb ass diorama you did in elementary school or whatever as a little kid, this is where that comes back to being useful again. Yes including the shitty craft stores where karens go to buy shit for their scrapbooking or whatever.

 

[Farm Hand]

Despite the prominence of texture paint, I remain a advocate of sand basing. The two applications of texture paint that I always notice are either thin-and-cracked or thick-and-"wavy", and neither look natural to me. I also imagine that it's a bother to apply just the right amount to get the same desired visual effect across a lot of bases. It's easy to be consistent with sand as long as you have the supply, and I just got an endless supply from a hardware store with a mix and granularity that I like a lot. I think it's remarkable that GW still mainly uses sand basing in their marketing work even though they have their own texture paint to sell.

As for rocks, I'm a huge fan of this stuff.

"But I can just grab tiny rocks outside!" you say. Well a peeve I have about normal rock basing is that rocks sit on top of the base such that you have to blend it in with surrounding sand/texture paint or else it looks unnatural. Tiny slate gravel you normally get for aquariums can help give the illusion of buried rocks, but you're also stuck with their smoothness. That's where these diced cork bits come. Cut them in half to create flat surfaces to glue to the base, and then after a paintjob, you have what looks like real buried rocks. They also weigh nothing, so they're not going to cause any damage if the model takes a fall.

 

[MazonLabs Recruitment Rep]

Despite the prominence of texture paint, I remain a advocate of sand basing. The two applications of texture paint that I always notice are either thin-and-cracked or thick-and-"wavy", and neither look natural to me. I also imagine that it's a bother to apply just the right amount to get the same desired visual effect across a lot of bases. It's easy to be consistent with sand as long as you have the supply, and I just got an endless supply from a hardware store with a mix and granularity that I like a lot. I think it's remarkable that GW still mainly uses sand basing in their marketing work even though they have their own texture paint to sell.

As for rocks, I'm a huge fan of this stuff.
View attachment 8410221
"But I can just grab tiny rocks outside!" you say. Well a peeve I have about normal rock basing is that rocks sit on top of the base such that you have to blend it in with surrounding sand/texture paint or else it looks unnatural. Tiny slate gravel you normally get for aquariums can help give the illusion of buried rocks, but you're also stuck with their smoothness. That's where these diced cork bits come. Cut them in half to create flat surfaces to glue to the base, and then after a paintjob, you have what looks like real buried rocks. They also weigh nothing, so they're not going to cause any damage if the model takes a fall.

Hmmm, all of my battlefields are urban based, and I've always wanted some things that look like fallen bricks amidst the rubble without cutting really tiny bits of sprue frames to do it....

 

[winderson_silva]

battle barge expansion.

Outside of a proper tutorial area to teach every mechanic (like the different Melee classes, healing mortal wounds), the barge is pretty pointless. You can only walk like 200m and can only interact with 2 screens and enter one place where sometimes a Lictor spawns. It could be just menus, and it would load the game faster.

 

[Mr Clark]

Texture paint is the lazy way of covering your base (cork, rock etc) with the same substance to even things out. Vince did a video that covered random items he liked and one that struck me was Liquitex Texture Course Medium. Its a clear texture that I believe doesnt crack, but is somewhere between clag and pva glue in texture, to craft your base surface. Its a hobby tool video I think.

Sand (small grain, its relative to the model) and dirt is super easy too, just make sure to either buy it or bake the stuff you find (germs).

I havent played with the water effects (and won't with resin and a small child) but theres some real potential there for setting a scene.

 

[Mr Clark]

Double post because completely different topic.

I posted about Maulerfiend and Heldrake ideas a while ago and I have two updates since things have advanced.

1. In a pack of 10 daemonettes, theres 2 with a wide leg pose that with minimal work (cutting a loin cloth) will fit over their necks. Spikes limit the sitting space (which isnt an issue) but the Maulerfiend has a large back so maybe I'll check out stls for a tower, like you put in elephants, to spice things up further. Box was cheap and daemonette bits should come in use. The sprues must be ancient as the parts arent even labelled.

2. Heldrake claws have 1 main talon and 2 sub-talons that connect via a ball joint. Opens pretty wide so I'll print a few marines to test the space but I reckon theres a good chance it will hold some Iron Hands. So questions are, do I put marines in one or both claws? What is the most Iron Hand marine? (Im thinking Heavy Intercessor or Techmarine).

Other than that, possible 1mm curb chain to act as the reins, linking daemonette to the big boy. Might bdsm up the daemonette or marines or both, who knows.

 

[Tri-Tachyon'sClown]

do I put marines in one or both claws?

One claw, might be a bit too much if you put a marine in each but I'd have to see it to really say.

What is the most Iron Hand marine?

I'm a big fan of the Praetor.

 

[p1138]

"Trench Crusade is going to take over wahammer!"
"GW is failing yet again!"
"The <whatever> scandal at GW has gotten worse!"

https://investor.games-workshop.com/annual-reports-and-half-year-results

The half year results are out. I'll post some of the more interesting pages.

Lots of additional money made. Still made 14 million on licensing(mostly videogames) without a huge release, it'll probably jump again after DoW comes out and then the Total War game. And this is even with HH 3.0 basically being a flop, and having a couple of LGS in North America throw public tantrums and claim they'll never sell warhammer shit again.

They're not interested in using AI for art or design at this point, and anyone claiming they have anything about the Amazon show is still full of shit and they aren't saying anything until they're ready, but they're almost done with a stand alone episode of an AoS show thing for Amazon(probably part of the option deal mentioned in previous financial reports).

Australia isn't buying as much. They want more chinabucks and are focused on Asia(this makes sense considering how many hobby videos I've seen popping up in Japanese, Chinese, and Korean over the past year). Closed 12 retail stores, opened 17 so they're still ahead on that front as well.

The new factory in the UK is due to start running this year. They bought more machines and re-arranged existing factory space. Are looking at buying a new UK warehouse. Saw a damn near 25% increase in warhammer+ subscriptions. And they're happy they got 1.5 million unique viewers for their world championships of warhammer thing.

Shit like this is how you can get an idea of how the company is actually doing. None of this "My Uncle's co-worker's cousin heard" or whatever clickbait video title with a sad Henry Cavill in the thumbnail or whatever is trying to tell you. I'm going to get back to assembling some re-casts.

 

[Gay Sex Enjoyer]

"Trench Crusade is going to take over wahammer!"

TC became modern GW without the former glory part in less than 2 years, they aren't taking over shit

 

[Inquisitor_BadAss]

There are so many kits coming out this month I have no idea what to buy. The brand new c'tan, made to order chaos kits and Shelob from Lord of the rings. We eating well lads and I hope the buffet never closes.

 

[p1138]

TC became modern GW without the former glory part in less than 2 years, they aren't taking over shit

Of course, but it was an example of a video title from youtube grifters talking out of their ass. A lot of them love making videos with asinine statements that could be refuted simply by spending 5 minutes looking through a doc like I did or anyone else can since they're posted and publicly available. Obviously other publicly traded companies also have to release statements but you look at one from a company like Ubisoft and it's just mealy mouthed bullshit dodging questions, trying to explain away failures, double speak, and so on. GWs are generally written in pretty plain English and to the point because they don't have to try and dodge around shit.

Just like how I've got no problem saying I'm not throwing money at them when I don't feel like it.

 

[Guntkvd]

Is it me, or PR speak for Warhammer show doesn't sound all that positive or promising? Yeah, we're doing something, it's outside our control, we have no idea when it will be done. Secret level was a foot in the door, now we're talking again, still no solid decision. Also, we made Aos episode (actually new info, also who fucking cares about AoS)

 

[Penne Dreadful]

A lot of them love making videos with asinine statements that could be refuted simply by spending 5 minutes looking through a doc like I did or anyone else can since they're posted and publicly available.

Quite possibly the best part of publicly-traded companies. It's depressing how few people bother to read them under any circumstances even if, as you correctly note, most aren't as pleasantly written as GW's.

 

[AncientPhosphur]

Finally got some time to restart Rogue Trader with all the DLC. It’s so good I was completely absorbed into it. I must’ve put 4-5 hours into it and only just made it to chapter 2 just with the bladedancer side quests exploring the ship.

Definitely went and preordered Dark Heresy because if all the DLC stuff was this entertaining so far I can’t wait to see what they have in store for DH.

 

[Second Missing Primarch]

Finally got some time to restart Rogue Trader with all the DLC. It’s so good I was completely absorbed into it. I must’ve put 4-5 hours into it and only just made it to chapter 2 just with the bladedancer side quests exploring the ship.

Definitely went and preordered Dark Heresy because if all the DLC stuff was this entertaining so far I can’t wait to see what they have in store for DH.

And we've still got two DLCs to go. I'm interested to see what they do with Trazyn in the third one.