Tag: Squad Caedes

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Blood Angels Space Marines Finished miniatures Lightbox photos Miniature painting Miniatures Warhammer 40k

And then there were none: Squad Caedes complete

Thanks to changes in point values (most of my Marines got more expensive) and unit classifications (my Scouts went from troops to elites), I had to drop a painted unit of Sternguard from my army, and replace half of the already-painted Squad Karios with another five tactical Marines, in order to bring my list into line with 9th Edition rules.

That left the five battle-brothers of Squad Caedes as the final unit I needed to paint in order to have my first-ever 40k army.

And now they’re done! I’ve finished my army!

Affirmative, brother-sergeant

Squad Caedes moves across the plains of Armageddon

The boards in the Battlezone: Manufactorum sets (Vertigus, in this case) make for great photo backdrops. I can’t wait to shoot my whole army on one of these, with terrain!

Squad Caedes, 2nd Company, 2nd Squad
Rear view

I’ll gather my entire force for a group photo or two in a future post. For now, a deep breath, a pause, and a shift to painting Deathskulls Orks and terrain pieces.

As I sit here writing this, I kind of can’t believe I finished my army.

But it just hit me that while I was a bit worried this moment would sap my momentum, when I finished I immediately built some Manufactorum terrain and primed some Ork Boyz, so I’d have stuff teed up to work on tomorrow — without even thinking about it. Minis every day, it’s a good feeling.

And finally, I’ve gotta close with the last WIP shot for my first army, Squad Caedes heading into highlights:

The last WIP photo I took before finishing this army
Out now: The Unlucky Isles

The Unlucky Isles [affiliate link], the first system-neutral guidebook for my Godsbarrow fantasy campaign setting, is now on DriveThruRPG.
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Miniature painting Miniatures Warhammer 40k WIP it good

WIP it good: Squads Caedes, Ariete, and misc.

Here are some WIP photos from November 7th, with lots on the go:

Squad Caedes, base-coated in every color except the two biggies (Leadbelcher and Mephiston Red)
Blue-Tack marking the “don’t prime me” spots on Sergeant Ariete’s tires and base
Partway through this multi-stage process
The undersides and bases of Squad Ariete primed
My work area covered in units in various stages of priming, painting, and curing

Not sure yet if those Infiltrators are going to be the back half of Squad Dolos or a fresh squad, but I’m torn because to have the minimum number of troops it’s better to split them into two squads…but that sets me further away from finishing the 2nd Company and I’m not sure I want 20 Infiltrators.

Out now: The Unlucky Isles

The Unlucky Isles [affiliate link], the first system-neutral guidebook for my Godsbarrow fantasy campaign setting, is now on DriveThruRPG.
Categories
Blood Angels Space Marines Miniature painting Miniatures Warhammer 40k WIP it good

WIP it good: Barakiel, Feo, Caedes, Remiel

Time to clear out the picture roll in my phone, which covers late October and early November!

The final touch-up on Squad Barakiel
Squad Barakiel fully touched-up and ready to shade (I think)
One of my busiest painting areas ever!
Squad Barakiel and their four wash/shade colors
Feo’s texture paint drying (for days…) and Squad Caedes freshly primed
Washing Feo’s texture paint and painting the scenery on Caedes’ bases

November is kicking off with some good momentum, and I have plenty more Blood Angels in the works for December and beyond.

Out now: The Unlucky Isles

The Unlucky Isles [affiliate link], the first system-neutral guidebook for my Godsbarrow fantasy campaign setting, is now on DriveThruRPG.
Categories
Blood Angels Space Marines Miniature painting Miniatures Warhammer 40k

Record scratch: No longer one squad away from a finished army

While wrapping up a highlight session on Squad Barakiel yesterday evening, I wanted to check a points value. I fired up BattleScribe, which updated…and showed me a bunch of errors for my army roster.

No biggie, I thought. Probably just wargear checkboxes. Which was the case for every change but one: Scouts, the bedrock of cheap troop choices, are now elites. Which meant my army, previously just a few hours of painting from being done, now needed a third squad of troops.

After playing around a bit with options, though, I’m not upset about it at all. Yeah, it spoils the lovely plan I had to wrap up with my favorite 40k unit, close-combat Terminators (I’m not putting them off just to preserve that plan!), but on the other hand it gives me a clear next unit to paint.

I don’t want to buy more minis right now (there are plenty in my queue already), so I filtered down to troops I have on hand and settled on adding a 5-man tactical squad. (I also considered just repainting the pauldrons and knees of half of Squad Karios, “creating” a new 5-man squad, but it didn’t feel right.)

Five battle-brothers taking shape

As always, I went with the Rule of Cool — in this case, a Storm Bolter and Power Axe for the sergeant, and a Missile Launcher for the squad. I also made sure the heavy weapon guy didn’t have kneepads, enabling me to swap him into any other tactical squad in the same company as needed (since he won’t have a squad insignia).

I also learned a lesson from my box of Primaris Infiltrators: Don’t assemble the entire kit if I don’t need every figure right away. If I’d built Squad Dolos, my five Infiltrators, and left the rest of that kit on sprues, I’d have been able to turn the remaining five into Incursors and drop them right into this army — but I built all 10 as Infiltrators. So half of this kit is staying in the box.

One enjoyable evening later, I had Squad Caedes (“massacre” in Latin):

Squad Caedes, 2nd Company, 2nd Squad

I’ve been looking forward to painting a vanilla tactical squad anyway, so this should work out nicely. They’re so much less bling-y than the dedicated Blood Angels models (and I didn’t swap in any BA bling) that they should be relatively quick to paint.

With my Scouts now filling an elite slot, I’m also considering dropping them in favor of a bike squad — or maybe just moving the bikes up in my painting queue. The points match up, and both units seem appropriate for this army. We shall see.

Between the transition from 8th to 9th and this reshuffling, I’ve had to rework my army twice while I was still in the middle of painting it. Maybe that’s always how it is with 40k? I don’t know — but it certainly keeps me on my toes.

Out now: The Unlucky Isles

The Unlucky Isles [affiliate link], the first system-neutral guidebook for my Godsbarrow fantasy campaign setting, is now on DriveThruRPG.