Tag Archives: miniatures

Kingbreakers’ Color Scheme

Posted on by

kingbreakers-iconHaving just finished a squad of Tactical Marines and some painting notes to go with them, I thought I’d post my basic color arrangement so that I have it archived for future reference. That seems like a good, simple practice to really help consistently painting an army over time. I will confess that I do have one half squad of Marines in my army that don’t quite match the others because I wasn’t paying attention and straight up forgot to switch to my usual color for the shoulders and arms…

My Kingbreakers army originated with an inkling of a chapter of Marines more or less founded out of a heavily wooded planet, Forestway. This was actually inspired by a great painting a former roommate had hanging in our kitchen of a dark, overgrown forest and a vague, shadowy path through the woods. To go along with that foundation fluff notion, I wanted a color scheme that had several colors—the Marines are good for patterns and big color blocks—but was somewhat muted, with heavy earthy tones. After playing around with some of the online Marine painting tools, I eventually came up with this draft in GW’s tool, which is apparently not online anymore:

kingbreakers-color-schemeSome of the colors have shifted a little bit as I’ve used different paints, tried some inks, started using more washes, etc., but in general I remain very happy with this basic arrangement and a few variants for HQs, Veterans, and so on. The following is the full rundown on my basic paint outline, roughly in the order I usually follow. Unless noted otherwise, these are GW paints and colors. My core colors however are from P3 mostly due to happenstance; I used to frequent a Privateer-dominated store and just wound up getting them from there one day when I was ready to start.

  • Legs: P3 Hammerfall Khaki
  • Arms & shoulders: P3 Ordic Olive
  • Body & pack: P3 Exile Blue
  • Gun muzzles, clips, leg and knee joints, tubes, some helmet grills: Boltgun Metal
  • Shoulder trim: Mechrite Red
  • Chest plate, stomach power coils, weapon badge, helmet: Dwarf Bronze (2 coats)
  • Belts, pouches, holsters: Scorched Brown
  • Highlight/edge belts, pouches, holsters: Snakebite Leather
  • Gun body: Chaos Black
  • Should Insignia: Skull White
  • Purity seals and parchments:
    • Wax—Mechrite Red
    • Paper—Dheneb Stone or Bleached Bone
    • Paper highlight—Skull White
    • Writing—Chaos Black or Scorched Brown
  • Highlight chest plate, weapon badge, helmet: Burnished Gold
  • Eye base: Mechrite Red
  • Drybrush gun body: Shadow Grey
  • Body and pack second coat: P3 Exile Blue
  • Shoulders and arms second coat: P3 Ordic Olive
  • Legs second coat: P3 Hammerfall Khaki
  • Highlight/edge pack and chest: Midnight Blue, Enchanted Blue
  • Highlight legs: Bleached Bone or Dheneb Stone (bring out edges, joints, etc)
  • Wash legs: Gryphonne Sepia
  • Wash body and pack: Asurmen Blue
  • Backpack details: Boltgun Metal (important to do after pack wash)
  • Wash chest plate, weapon badges, guns, blades, helmets, backpack details: Badab Black
  • Iris of eyes: Blood Red (important to do after washing helmet)
  • Apply shoulder decals
  • Wash shoulders, arms: Thraka Green

Most of my marines have Kingbreakers icon shoulder decals, shown in the top right of this post. Without any clear inspiration, another foundational idea for my chapter that developed at some point is that one of their first missions involved dethroning—and in the process obliterating—a heretic king and his dominion. From that came the “Kingbreakers” moniker and the icon. I whipped up the latter in Illustrator based on some artwork I had made previously and printed it out on decal paper. The latter is somewhat of a hassle to acquire and not particularly cheap (it’s the shipping that kills), but worth it. The effect of that custom iconography on the look of my units is great, really boosting the uniqueness and ownership. I use MicroSol and MicroSet to apply them. A good writeup on working with custom decals is online at BoLS.

At the moment my least favorite process is painting the arms. For some reason they’re just always a hassle and the most fiddly bit. Looking to improve in the future, I need to move around some of my highlights and do more after the washes to bring the colors back out. I could also stand to put in more details, even just with some Boltgun Metal, of the arm panels, joints, etc., which I tend to skip.

However, long story short, that is how I do up my Kingbreakers, little by little!

Reinforcements for Sergeant Titus' Tactical 2 wait for their base flock to dry before leaping into the fray!

Reinforcements for Sergeant Titus' Tactical 2 wait for their base flock to dry before leaping into the fray!

Philadelphia 750pt Combat Patrol League

Posted on by

combat-patrol

Just put out on the PAGE Center City listserv:

40k players,
I’m happy to announce a special event we’ll be running this winter: A 750pt Combat Patrol tournament league. Hopefully everybody can and will join in, I think this will be really fun. We’re going to be pushing this out to the players at Redcap’s as well as Internet forums, hoping to reach out and find even more players around Philly.
Details are online, but basic scheme is: Reg is $3, all going toward prizes for the winner. The tournament will run for 5 rounds. For the first 3 rounds, pairings and mission rules we be posted. Players will then have 2 weeks to meet up and play their matches, either on their own or at PAGE or Redcap’s. It’d be great to have everyone get together at Redcap’s to play on Saturday, Jan 16, but it’s optional.
The final 2 rounds will be held at PAGE the last week in February, Sunday the 28th. If we get a bunch of non-PAGE people to sign up it could be a really big night of 40k, and we might make the final missions pretty dramatic and exciting to match!
Pretty standard Combat Patrol rules apply, caveat a 750pt limit rather than 400pt. All those details are on the web. Missions will be narrative oriented, following a storyline through the tournament. Most will have asymmetric scenarios—matches will be two games, with players alternating roles. Should take about 3 hours total.
Let me know if there are questions, and start getting your strategery on! Jason and I have already started whipping up 750 pt lists so we can ensure we get all our preferred units painted! In addition, Redcap’s just happened to have 750pt 40k gaming on their schedule for this Saturday (Dec 19th) at noon. That’d be a great chance to start trying out your list. I’ll be there, and it’d be great to see some other PAGE players there as well!
Thx

Hopefully the missions and rules may be of use to others outside the Philadelphia area, and it’d be great to meet any Philly area lurkers out there! Expect bat reps, narrative updates, and mission scenarios to show up on this blog as they develop.

More Info!

New Camera: Canon S90

Posted on by

As an early Christmas present to myself, I recently ordered a new camera, a Canon PowerShot S90. My fiancee got a new bicycle, now well outnumbering my own, so I figured a self-present was justified. Before ordering I debated a lot between the S90 and several other options, namely the Canon G11 and Panasonic Lumix LX-3. The full debate and the rationale for that type of camera (high end point-and-shoot, as opposed to a cheaper point-and-shoot, DSLR, or 3/4) will have to be the subject of a longer future post. However, it came today, and—damn—am I impressed already. First of all, it only took two hours to fully charge, is tiny, has an amazing screen, solid looking menu system, and worked right off the bat downloading to my Mac (Linux will be the big test later). But, what about the real deal? How’s it shoot?

In a word: Incredibly.

Freshly armoured Sergeant Titus and battle brother await reinforcements arriving from the background!

Freshly armoured Sergeant Titus and battle brother await reinforcements arriving from the background!

titus-preview2

Click on the photos for the true glory to show through.

I think those look pretty good, and that’s without doing anything except autocorrecting the white balance afterward. No adjusted shutter speed, timer & stand, lightbox, or anything. By the time I get all that set, I’ll have to have learned to paint much better for the minis to do the photos justice! Expect many more pics to show up in this blog from now on. Awesomesauce!