40k Combat Patrol Character 1 - Chief Librarian Tigurius

As an absolute sucker for the Combat Patrol magazine, I declined to opt out when Hachette warned me that they would charge an extra tenner for another delivery. 

As such, I ended up with an extra model to deal with - Chief Librarian Varro Tigurius of the Ultramarines.

In keeping with my approach to the other marines, I've gone for a "2nd-edition-inspired" colour scheme, and tried to follow the rules from the 90's Codex Ultramarines. 

For that reason, I've gone with a bright red cloak and yellow sash thing - which was listed as part of the uniform for a librarian but these days seems to have been forgotten. 

I did agonise over that for a bit, given it means he looks different to other versions of him and this is after all a specific character rather than a generic librarian, but then had the blindingly obvious revelation that it's possible that the centuries-old, very high-ranking psychic supersoldier might just possibly own more than one cloak. 

I also went for a bit of a stylistic choice on his armour - Ultramarines are generally very bright blue, and the librarians of any codex chapter are also meant to wear blue armour. I decided to make a distinction between the two - so the majority of Tigurius's armour is a darker blue to show he's a librarian, with his shoulder and kneepad in the brighter Ultramarines blue of his chapter. 

I'm really happy with how he's come out, and I really enjoyed doing this model - something with a decent amount of detail but enough freedom in how I painted it to avoid things becoming a chore!

Of course, this is currently my only Primaris Ultramarine, but the genius of choosing Genesis as my main chapter then shines through - it's entirely plausible, since Genesis's background is basically "spare Ultramarines", to justify Tigurius joining them for a mission - or even to have him come with an Ultramarines bodyguard. So maybe I'll do a few more at some point.

Anyway, the delivery was labelled "character 1", so that's ominous, and I expect Hachette will make a further move on my bank account in due course.

40k Combat Patrol Delivery 8 - Leaving on a Jet Bike

This time, I present a set of six relatively simple models that for some reason took me ages to paint.

Eldar jetbikes! 

Or, if you absolutely must, Aeldari Windriders!

For some reason, I really struggled to get going with these, so painting the first three models took a long time to do.

It was only when I realised I was half way through that I suddenly shook myself by the shoulders and did the other three in a batch really quickly, which had been the idea all along.

Anyway, not a lot to say about these. I decided to make the bikes mostly white because the green I think looks a bit streaky on large flat areas and I don't have a good non-contrast match for it yet. That lead me to inverting the colours for the riders compared to the squad of guardians I'd already done, just to break things up a bit visually. 

I did also enjoy doing the barbed vine things - I like messing with freehand anyway, but these were particularly nice as I'm going for unique, natural looking patterns, so it's much more forgiving than trying to paint something very neat.

I suppose if I was up to date, this smaller delivery would have given me time to do something else. But I'm not, so onto the next thing!

40k Combat Patrol Premium Delivery 1 - Bigger Boys

Part of my insane, money-burning approach to the 40k Combat Patrol magazine is the Premium subscription. I pay a bit more for each issue, to then get some extra deliveries with more models.

The first of these gave me extras for the Tyranids and space marines - a Hive Tyrant and a Brutalis Dreadnought.

I went for the Hive Tyrant first of all.

The approach of the publishers is to use the full kits, but without the packaging or original instructions. So, following the instructions I was given would have meant building the standard "venom cannon and lash whip" build, but there was no way that was happening...

So I had to build it with wings. 

I really like this model - I won't go through the colour scheme again as it's the same as for the other Tyranids, with maybe a bit more Absolution Green to pick out some details.

It's a satisfyingly huge model, so I assume it will never survive to turn 3 of any game.

The marines get the Brutalis Dreadnought. 

I varied this one slightly from the suggested build too, by giving it the power fists rather than lightning claws. 

Partly this was to make it a nicer fit for the 5th Edition rules (it has twin multimeltas, two power fists and two storm bolters - easy enough to count as one of each and comply with the rules).

Mostly though, I'd had the idea to put the classic black and yellow hazard stripes on the fingers and I really wanted to do that.

I did still have a problem - for 10th Edition, the twin heavy stubbers (which have another name I can't be bothered to check) are required, but there's no way to do that in 5th. Fortunately, those sit on a sort of hatch thing that will sit in place without glue, so I was able to print a set of smoke launchers to match the 5th Edition loadout.

I was particularly lucky to manage a perfect fit on the first try, so now I'm able to swap between them depending on which game I'm playing.

I will say I found this model overall to be very fiddly to paint - the sarcophagus opens, for no apparent reason, and lots of bits are visible but inaccessible on the finished model, so have to be painted before gluing everything together. 

Still, it's done now, so as long as I avoid getting another one, everything is fine!

40k Combat Patrol Delivery 7 - Guardians of Part of the Galaxy

This month's set (I can't even remember what month this was, but I'm catching up, I swear it) is all about the Eldar. Or Aeldari if you must.

I mentioned in the last post that I'd gone somewhat out of order, as I used the set of guardians to work out the paint scheme before tackling the Farseer. Here they are:

The green helmets were the most annoying part of these. That's partly my own fault - I need to find a decent non-contrast match for Speed Paint Orc Skin, as that would give me an easier way to deal with big smooth areas like these. 

Still, I'm not complaining - these are bog standard troops, and they look fine with that in mind.

Of a bit more interest was the Wraithlord, which is a model with a surprising amount of options for something apparently so simple. This led to a fair amount of agonising over the loadout, before eventually going for exactly what the magazine told me to do anyway.

I went for basically the same colour scheme on this as I did for the guardians, and it was a pretty quick paint job overall, so that's a win. More of these to come!