Coming back to wargaming always means one thing: spending money. This time I got myself an airbrush and so far I have to say I love it. Base coating models takes minutes and I get a nice finish which, for marine armies means I’m at a standard where I am happy to play in a fraction of the time. A quick blast of a slightly lighter shade from above as well and it even looks like I have put effort into it!
My problem has always been simple: I don’t want to play with unpainted models and I don’t ever finish enough to play. This way I can get around this and actually get some games in. A result all round that justifies having a shiny new compressor chugging away as I paint.
I’ve even almost finished my first model, a Grey Knight Dreadknight. Bolt gun metal base, lighter metal shading from above and some black and blue washes for the main panels. Gold for the highlights and you’re almost done.Yes I decided to start with a GK army because it was an easy way to start getting back into the feel of painting again. My next army will be something more complicated.
The plan is to get two forces going so I can play on a whim. This means I need to choose a second. The choices are as follows:
Blood Angels
A boring power armour army? Yes, and not too different in looks than the Grey Knights but with the airbrush I can paint red like never before. The part of me who started with 40k in the late 80s needs a red army.
Orks
What can I say except Orks have always been my favourite army. Them not being as competitive as they should be doesn’t put me off as they have never really been as good as they should but I just love the concept.On the other hand when you have large squad sizes that means a tedious amount of painting that I don’t want to get bogged down on.
Tyranids
Who doesn’t like unstoppable killer insect-like aliens? A lot of models to paint though…
Dark Eldar
Just got some new models released = enough for me to be interested it seems. I never really paid them much attention before and a voice at the back of my mind is saying to try something new.
Since my goal is to have the ability to play at home when I feel like it (and a suitable opponent is visiting) I need two armies as quickly as possible. This does sort of rule out Orks and Tyranids so they can be back burner projects for now with me painting their cooler looking models in the background. My desire to paint red has to be balanced out against the fact that they are power armour and my GK are as well so I think that means that there is a Dark Eldar battleforce purchase in my future.
The plan is to get 500 points up and running quickly, then 1000 and then move up to 2000. I think a realistic goal is a unit (10 models max) a week to start with as I don’t want to go nuts yet. I’m very rusty after all and painting has moved on a long way since I last did this in any volume.
I have a basic army list for the GK pencilled out, which means I’m happily working towards a terminator squad this week. My Dreadknight needs to be finished as well, but that just means airbrushing some swish into the sword (that makes sense to me, live with it)
I also have an Uncharted Seas Ork fleet to finish painting, which is insane considering how little needs to be done to finish them. I think I’m going to need a lot more picture heavy posts from now on.
