First Hammerhead..

Yes it seems that the 40k bug has firmly taken hold of me.. this isn't to say that my napoeonics project will suffer too much, although I have been wondering lately if I should re-base them for slightly higher level gaming (you know where one stand = a Battalion etc...) Sam Mustafa's next game Blucher promises to be good so... who knows.

Anyway, here's the Hammerhead. I'm pretty happy with it, although i think it looks better in real life than in my photos. I might do a little more weathering in the future but for now she'll do the trick.

First Tau squad complete...

Yep..here they are.

I'm going to make my own house decals for the wpns at some stage but these guys are ready to fight for the greater good!

FOW FOR SALE!

I'm selling these to fund another project.. hopefully I get some good interest..

Tau have messed up my painting desk...

So... back in the dark old days I used to play WH40k. I must admit that while I love the concepts and minis that GW have brought out, I am almost sickened by the price tag they slap onto everything. Regardless of all the arguments in terms of cost to create and market their toys, when you're looking at $45 AU for 12 plastic figures, it's not chicken feed.

Having said all that I've just started building a new Tau 40k army! Price be damned I say, I just want it! Not that I'm going to buy the army in one hit.. far too expensive, I'll just plod along with this as a side project to my 6mm Naps, which are still No1 in terms of priorities (I..have..to..finish..something.....).

Anyway, being that it's 40k, I thought I would create a Tau army based (loosely obviously) on a futuristic Tsuranni clan Acoma from the books written by Raymond Feist and Janny Wurts. If you're not familiar with these books, they are based on the political mechanisms and upheavals in a fantasy society that is sort of a cross between ancient Roman and Dynastic Japanese. WHile the Tau themselves in the WH40k Universe are more into peace than there Tsuranni descendants (who in the above mentioned books where all about war and ritual suicide!), There's enough scope to play with the fluff... anyway that's the plan, and I think it will look pretty cool. The house symbol for House Acoma is a Shatara bird(?) which I would love to get some decals made in white for my Tau's armour, however, I have no idea if that is possible.

Anyway, I have painted a sample Fire Warrior which while he needs a little work (I really want to do squad markings but need to figure out a tidy way of doing it as I don't trust my free hand, and it would just annoy me to settle for less than perfect for them), I'm pretty happy with the colours etc... and the overall paint job I'll never win a painting comp!). It's not award winning, but it looks ok, and I can churn them out relatively quickly. Man it's such a huge change going from 6mm to 28mm..

Anyway it's never been my style on this blog to bore with wordy meanderings, so here's the first House Acoma Tau!


So there you have it... I have not worked out exactly what I'll have in my army, but I'm not particularly interested in any Kroot at this stage, I don't think they would fit the theme, however you never know as I will look at building up to about 3000pts so I can play the occasional big game.

And lastly, I am normally keen on a pretty tidy painting desk, but have let it go a little lately, so I'll throw a pic in there of that, as I know I'm always facinated to see people's painting/hobby spaces. Also, I'll throw in a few pics of where my Naps are up to. I think they are looking damned good, and am looking forward to getting a copy of Lasalle soon and having a game early in the new year. It really does look the part, so hopefully we can convince a few more Canberrans to have a go!

Timecast 6mm buildings..

I finally got around to painting my Timecast buildings, and I must say I am very impressed with them.

Not only are they excellent scale models, but they are very well cast with almost no flash or miscasts.

So here they are. Some of the pics have some of my Adler Russians marching up the street, and while the two brands don't scale together particularly well, I think the effect is fine in 6mm.



These are from the Napoleonic 6mm series, and I would highly recommend them to anyone.

Marcus

A little more progress..

Not a whole lot to report really, however I do now have a gaming table (pretty fundamental in terms of this actually being a gaming room!).

Also, I finally got my print on the wall.. and I must admit, it looks pretty dashing! The framing turned out pretty much exactly as I wanted it.

The other major thing is my glass cabinet is in. I think in the future I will likely need another couple of these.

I started a thread on The Miniatures Page in regards to how to actually do the gaming table top. While the table itself you can see in these pictures is temporary until I can put something better together (with storage etc...) I am actually pretty happy with the way the top of it turned out. All I did was die a white sheet of polar fleece brown, then spray paint it with beige, and two shades of green... I then added static grass in parts, and the odd area of rocks etc... hills were simply some left over polar fleece under the top-sheet, although it's still not stable enough yet in my opinion (those edges hanging over the sides look untidy too.. soon to be fixed though).

Here are some shots a bit closer up of the base cloth...



So over all things are looking a lot more like a gaming room. Still plenty to do though!

Marcus

The fun part....

Here we go.. the fun part!

As I said in my last post I still have a glass display cabinet coming that is in the same finish as the book shelves. I've also been looking out for a couple of nice chairs to go in the corner with a table... somewhere to relax whilst another commander takes his turn perhaps?

Still looks bare of course.. I have alot of things to go up on the walls yet. But all in good time. Still waiting on that Napleonic Print I ordered ..hmmm..

And of course, no table! I'll fix that this coming weekend... then I'm pretty much set...

I've got loads of room to paint, and the other workbench will be for the bigger jobs (such as cutting up tiles for modular terrain etc...).

I've still got a bunch of books to move outside too.. but as you can see it's taking shape!

Marcus