Hive Fleet Behemoth Tyrannofex Showcase

This will be the last one for a while from the spawning ponds. I'm going elbow deep into the Horus Heresy from now until I have a solid 2.5k completed for them as the local scene is really picking up and the game system is a lot stronger than 40k.

Shelving this project is kinda good actually, I feel like the last two models I have painted for the nids have been a massive drag and taken me far too long for the outcome.

That said, I'm petty happy with this bloke and the Malanthrope completed before it, the whole force looks pretty shit hot on the table with the pearl blue over red and bases done up.

Tyrannofex tripping on Acid

I'm not convinced that anyone is actually checking in, but I'll be back with some assembled Sons of Horus marines and stuff in a couple weeks/month.

Nids - Benched.

Showcase: Hive Fleet Behemoth Malanthrope

I hated painting this model.. Normally not something I would say about the amazing sculpts from Forge World but I was stuck in a quagmire when it came to getting it done, there was just something about it.. In the end I actually painted it completely twice, just because I wasn't happy with the finish the first time so I just re-primed the thing and started again over the top. Now, I am happy enough with the results, the Malanthrope looks pretty grim, all covered in gore and juice as it picks its way around the battlefield farming the corpses of the fallen.

Anyway, I'm really glad it's done, its got a hell of a lot of utility on the battlefield!

Hive Fleet Behemoth Lictor

I didn't have a lot of time this week so I just punched out this Lictor pretty quickly.. Dude's a murderer so I kinda wanted him to be coated in gore, I'll try and acquire some bitz to add a body in the future as well but at the moment all I have is Tyranid stuff. The tree is actually pretty shit hot, the other pics were slightly out of focus so I will try and show it again at some point in the future. 

Hive Fleet Behemoth Lictor, just lurking by trees and hunting men for sport in his leisure time.

Hive Fleet Behemoth Carnifex x2 Finished.

Dakkafex Smash bros!

I've had one painted for ages, it was actually the first Tyranid I painted and added to it today with another, both are rescue nids from bad homes and they took some work to get into good poses. Being rescue nids that were already painted, a little bit of details was lost in spots where I was painting over paint for the second time.

Unfortunately when I was applying the sealant to the latest one though after finishing it, it somehow managed to shrink the carapace paint as it dried and rip some tiny fissures showing the red base coat. It's not ideal but it doesn't really look terrible either, he has the more beat up carapace anyway so it could visually count towards more battle damage.




I'm pretty happy, it's nice that the pair is complete now. That puts me at a progress pic, my nids look really washed out on my desk and the only large dark cloth we had was a dark blue towel which makes the photo look a bit funny, but, checkit ~1360pts as would be played:

Hive Fleet Behemoth Tyrannocyte

Still waiting on some magnets to attach the guns to the top end of this guy but he is as good as done really. I hate the symmetry of this model a lot but I love the way it works in-game. I think the next one I get I will make an effort to convert the tentacles a bit more and maybe do an open version of it like the Sporocyst.

I had a game with the nid's against DC's Necrons last night and the new blue carapace looks mint on the table. It was an 1850pt game and I thoroughly got my face punched in, we called it on turn 5 with my forces reduced to the Crone, a Warrior squad, 2 Hive Guard and a lonely Hormagaunt while he still had probably 10 units on the table (All at reduced strength) and almost all the objectives secured.

I really like the Tyrannocyte for being able to speed up the nid's MC's and it's really nice to put a T-fex in the back field of your opponents force and the venom cannons are a really nice bonus.

Hive Fleet Behemoth Hive Crone

I'm pretty happy with how the pearl blue carapace is looking on the nids and this completed Hive Crone would have to be one of my favourite models from the range. I wasn't sure I could pull it off consistently as the Mr. Crystal Colour Lacquer is a hard to apply but I'm 3 models down now (Tyrant, Tyrannocyte and this guy) and it's going quite well. I went with the Harpy head and tried to infer with the green goop that he vom's the template, I hate the mouth gun component of the head from the harpy as it looks like it is choking on an icecream cone.

Tomorrow I will spend the day bringing the rest of the guys up to scratch with the new blue effect which will see me with a completely painted 1250pts. I'm actually really stoked on that, it doesn't seem like a huge achievement but if the Red Scorpions were anything to go by, the first 2k took forever to get done and then everything after that seemed to fly by.

Anyway, thoughts?

Cheers
Redscorps

Finished a my Flyrant, pics and banter.

Ermahgerd, I've managed to finally paint another nid model after getting some mojo back for the hobby via painting that Roboute Guilliman model for my mate Wozz.

I've mixed things up a bit and used Mr. Colour pearlescent blue on the carapace and I'm pretty happy with how it has come out. It's translucent save for the kinda metallic blue pigment and looks pretty flashy (I think) over the black base coat and blue line highlighting.

The rest of the model was done as per the rest of the army which I am now going to go and backdate with the new carapace design.

I think up next will be the Tyrannocyte drop pod for something different. I'm going to start trying to tick off 250pts a month again until I can get the force up to 1850 for a tourney.

Anyway enough yab, pics:

Hive Tyrant head WIP picture.

Small amount of progress again this week after getting the Hive Guard finished last week, I'm struggling with the Mojo a bit lately!

 I'm quite proud of the wet blending result on the big dog's horn, I have never been very good at it but decided to try and up my game with the brush and give it a go. I used GW acrylics, Abbadon Black to Gorthor Brown and topped it off with Rakarth Flesh. Each was mixed with a drop of AK Interactives Acrylic Drying Retarder and blocked in place before being feathered together. The rest of his body is coming along well, I've got it about 60% done at the moment and should finish it off over the weekend.

 

3 Hive Guard join the ranks, progress has slowed, but things are still getting finished.

I have slowed a little on the painting front. I've been racing the bike again on the weekends and training for Gridiron season during the week so I haven't been ticking off as much as I would have liked lately. I took a day out today though and painted the 3 hive guard you can see in the back. It puts me at 750pts completed so far as I run them in the game, not bad for a few months and probably enough to keep up with an escalation league format. I'm going to paint a few more guys from the Infinity Aleph Steel Phalanx to get me up to 300pts for that system and make sure the paint jobs are consistent between them then flick back over to painting the 'nids again and try to push for 1k by the end of August.

Made a light box, some better pics of the growing Tyranid swarm?

These kinda turned out ok, they have to be a little dark as the models themselves are quite dark but I still need to figure out the colour balance a bit better so I can get the red to pop without turning the rest of the model into a neon disaster. Also excuse the photo of the gants, must have bumped the camera. So everything I have painted now is done, I'm working on Hive Guard now, the new kit is really slick!

The Tuesday Update: Hive Fleet Behemoth Tervigon and Tyranid Warriors plus an updated group shot.

I can only really paint one, maybe two days a week if I am lucky so progress is quite slow. I pulled a big day last week though and was really happy with how the Warriors came out, I added some red blood splatter to these cats as they are often at the front of the swarm ploughing into the enemy lines trying to help (often, futile efforts).

I've taken a couple of more detailed pics of the Tervigon and the Tyranid Warriors and this weeks painting effort was centred around 10 new Termagants who are near(ish) completion, with the line highlight, blue wash of the carapace then gloss coating it, OSL type eyes and a few little details remaining to finish the models.

I am going to do a mad day of basing all these guys soon actually, I just really don't enjoy that as much as painting the models themselves so I would prefer to do it all in a big block.

Paint Progress Shot. Tervigon is done, started the Warriors.

X-25 Tamiya Clear Green is probably my favourite thing at the moment. I mixed it in with a few different GW paints to get the kind of slime look that I wanted on the Tervigon and it's base and I'm really happy with the result. 

So as far as progress goes I finished the Tervigon on Monday, and based both that and the Mucolid. The Warriors I started yesterday and are not far away from the finishing touches now. The Termagants need basing. 

I'm pretty happy with how it's all coming along:

Mucolid Spore and Tervigon WIP shot.

So I made a bit of progress today which feels really good! I have been fighting for time lately around girlfriend, work and sport time commitments mean at best I can paint for a bit on a Monday or Tuesday. I'm pretty happy with how the big spore bomb has come out, I still have to finish the base and add a few minor details but the bulk is done.

The Tervigon has quite a way to go, I've been working my way back from the front end with the head and spawned 'gants finished. I had a real win too with the Tamiya Clear Red X-27 I normally use for blood effects also being available in green (X-25) which I have sponged and stippled on to the front end where they are bursting out. It looks gross, cool!

500pt Combat Patrol - Tyranids vs Necrons & Alpha Legion - Hive Fleet Behemoth Swarms.

Tyranids, 500pts.. I had only seen this going poorly. With the Adepticon: Combat Patrol rules we were using restricting models other than troops to 2 wounds max, and a restriction in usable slots, I went with the best list I could figure for the value while still getting a hefty MC on the ground to punch it out. I listed it out in the previous post but here it is again for context:

1x Venomthrope

30x Termagants - Fleshborers

1x Tervigon - Adrenal Glands, Toxin Sacs, Electroshock Grubs, Stinger Salvo, Scything Talons

3x Warriors - Deathspitters, Scything Talons

The first match was against MB with 30k Legion Marines, he had:

10x Legion Tac Marines

1x Contemptor Dread - 2x Kheres Assault Cannons

1x Sicarian Battle Tank - JerkCannons and Heavy Bolter Sponsons

It was a match up that kinda petrified me as I could just see him tearing apart the Tervigon and the whole mess coming undone as I was left with 30 useless 'gants and a bunch of Warriors that couldn't do much. We got the Relic mission and I pushed hard to get on it with the 30 'gants before his Tac Marines could capture it. I pushed out 2 decent sized batches of new 'gants before the Tervigon ran dry and used I the spawned gants to push back the Contemptor (MB was trying to avoid CC, definitely the way to go with this guy) and finally engage it in close combat to stifle it's heavy influence on the game. 

The Venomthrope shadowed the Tervigon around as I moved everything up the guts and the big blob of 'gants captured the Relic before moving away from the Contemptor and Sicarian to shoot up the Tac Marines with the Warriors providing Synapse and fire support. I stuffed up my synapse coverage in this match though and the 'gants locking the Contemptor up were not fearless and were consequently over-run with the loss of an initiative roll off. The Tervigon got the Sicarian down to a single hull point before it bit the dust but by this time it was too little too late for the marines as the fearless blob squad and the 3 Warriors locked up the Contemptor for the remainder of the game after destroying the last of the Tac squad, netting me the win.

It was a really close game, the termagant swarm got pretty close to 60 which was pretty hard for his 12 models to deal with alongside the Shrouding from the Venomthrope and the Catalyst being cast from the Tervigon where needed. Great match though!

Result: 

Behemoth - Relic, Warlord, Linebreaker (but we called it as turn 5 came around)

MB - First Blood, Warlord

The second match was against DC with his Necrons, he had:

1x Lord (Veil of Darkness)

5x Deathmarks

6x Immortals

5x Immortals

4x Tomb Blades

1x Heavy Destroyer

DC and I are always very closely matched as the shooting range is pretty similar between the Tyranids and Necrons. This game was no exception! DC having watched me play MB in the match before went straight for the throat on turn 1, using the blast weapons that ignore cover from the Tomb Blades to hit the Tervigon he could see, and kill the Venomthrope that was hiding behind it that he couldn't see, dropping the cover save shenanigans immediately and meaning I was on +5's from that point out. 

The swarm grew, the Tervigon batched 4 times actually with the smallest lot of 6 coming on turn 4 with was perfect for the points weighted objectives game we were playing. We pushed aggressively up the middle from the start with pretty much the entire Necron force including the deep striking Deathmarks concentrating on trying to take down the lumbering Tervigon from the get go to limit the amount of spawns and synapse I would have at my disposal. 

DC played well, it wasn't to be though as the growth of the swarm and the resilience of the Tervigon with the +3 armour, cover saves and Catalyst being too much for the shooting and manoeuvrability of the Necrons to overcome. The game ended on turn 5 with a roll but the Necrons were starting to be in trouble as the Tyranids began assaulting units, becoming unavailable to shoot at while still holding the objectives in most cases. Great match though also!

Result:

Behemoth - 11 Points (10 Objective, Linebreaker)

DC - 6 Points (4 Objective, First Blood)

It was a really good night of gaming, we got another buddy into it too and he helped steer the nids at the start of the second match with me for his first time playing 40k. I was really happy with the list too, the damage output is horribly low, but the birthed 'gants ad a huge amount of utility to the force which kinda makes up for it if you can use them right (and maintain the damn synapse web!).

Here are a couple of crappy iphone pics to show how the final game ended up:

500pt Tyranids in Combat Patrol and the Infinity Moto.Tronica cheap-o-table project.

Hi!

We're about to start playing a 500pt tournament amongst my gaming group using the Adepticon: Combat Patrol rules and I figured I'd need a table to host some matches on.

When Operation Ice Storm was launched, I was really impressed by the visuals of the card scenery included in the set. I didn't jump on board with the whole set as I have quite a lot of Aleph already so I just bought 4 of the scenery packs with the idea of making a 4'x4' table from them in the future. They sat unwrapped for quite a while but with the tournament kicking off tomorrow night I figured I would get to assembling them so we could use it as a second table.

Theres probably a bit much for 40k but with no area terrain as such you'd only be getting LoS cover saves so maybe it works out? It's a bit thin for infinity compared to the other tables I have played on though but it's still pretty decent for $40 worth of card!

I bought 2x 1200x600x6mm sheets of MDF with a laminate on one side that I sprayed adhesive on to and rolled out the included maps on an angle, as it dried I trimmed the edges flush with the boards and used the off-cut pieces to fill in the corners. The stacked buildings were glued in place with lower tabs of the second and third stories left unfolded for support so they can anchor on the top lip of the lower levels.

I think the angle of the 'streets' looks much cooler than using them square to the board edges and I'm really impressed with the quality of the card and detail of the maps! It's all pretty solid stuff, you'd have to be pretty clumsy or heavy handed with your models to damage anything!

So yeah, this 500pt tournament! The rules kinda nerf my favourite 'nid-zilla style lists with minimal little bugs and as many T6 big bugs as I can fit in around that. With a modification of wounds to W2 for anything other than a troop it's not really worth my while taking anything other than a Troop-Tervigon as far as a big bug goes, that does also unfortunately leave me tied to the 30 'gants as well which don't tend to do much more than suck fire and camp on an objective.

So with an alarmingly low damage output I have decided to field for exactly 500pts:

1x Venomthrope
30x Termagants - Fleshborers
1x Tervigon - Adrenal Glands, Toxin Sacs, Electroshock Grubs, Stinger Salvo, Scything Talons
3x Warriors - Deathspitters, Scything Talons

I thought about taking Regen on the Tervigon instead of the other upgrades but if it spawns itself out on turn 1, there will be very little utility coming from it, at least with AG/TS and some extra ranged weaponry it can hoon around the board and hopefully cause a bit of mischief while spawning objective grabbers.

I guess the idea will be to just try and stay in the Venomthrope bubble for as long as it lives and move up as much as possible.

We'll see! I have to play against 30k Alpha Legion Marines and 40k Necrons tomorrow, I can see the Scicarian, Contemptor with Kheres Assault Cannons and Tomb Blades all making life very difficult for me!