Tyranid Prime...Updated!

Over the next month or so I will be updating a bunch of my older units with new weapon load outs. That is one of the best things about any new Nid codex is that you always have to pop the arms off all your guys and give them new guns (I know sarcasm doesn't carry well over written text lol). That being said I didnt mind updating this guy just because he had chapter house resin boneswords which were terrible. So after building my Tyrant Guard I ended up having lots of left over pieces so I decided to give this guy one of their new Boneswords and Lashwhips. So here he is with his new weapons!

Continuing the Big Guy: Judicator

An update on the Judicator project.  I finished all the cleaning (including some that required a dremel tool).  Also green stuffed some of the more egregious pock marks and air pockets in the resin.  Here are some pics.  Still waiting for the snow to melt so I can prime everything in black. My green stuff skills are improving but still hard to use.  The photos look worse than they are.  Perhaps I should invest in better sculpting tools to get it into the cracks.

These are the mini assemblies that I will prime, paint and then glue together.  Not sure if I'll need to pin any of them.  One thing about the Warmachine 'Jacks is they have really thin mid sections. Hope the big guy doesn't break in half..

 

One of the worst pock marks required me to rebuild the pointy section to make it look Protectorate enough.  Should be good enough.

Filled in cracks here.

 Needed a dremel to remove the flash pipes on the left knee pad.  The right one is what it was "supposed" to look like.  At least it fits now.

Even if my green stuff skills are not great, at least they wont' be that visible.  Even here on the arm guards, the GS is on the bottom.

Bend Spear Fixed with Hot Water

Just a quick update about the plastic spear problem.  As pointed (pun intended!) out by Dai from my last post, using hot water to heat up the plastic and simply bend the spear back was indeed the solution.  I even found I didn't have to bend the spears, they practically straightened themselves out.  It was amazing to watch.  Check out this photo:

 Straight as an arrow.  Boomsnaps.

Wizwar 3D print tests

I've been interested in the boardgame Wizwar and really liked the plaster molded pieces, but decided to print my own.  Its been a bit of a pain getting "biologial" and curvy edges, but the results are encouraging.  I printed similar parts together as one .stl file so that we can print multiple pieces at once. Still more to print, and I'll have to spray them gray to look like stone, but still..

Beginning the Big Guy: Judicator Colossal

Well, I was in the office doing some 3D printing (more on that later), and figured I'd just go ahead and start the Judicator. Really cool model.  There's still lots of snow here in NY, so I can't prime any of the blank figs just yet, so its just cleaning.

Open the box, and here's what you get.  There is a huge base and even a large cardboard wreck market underneath all this.  No instruction manual, but there is a single sheet assembly sheet.  Not bad, but many of the pieces look the same, especially in the middle.  Just check out how many pieces there are for this guy.. 

Lots of pieces, and all the pieces have some kind of flash on them.  There's a few metal pieces, but most of them are a resin.

Sometimes there is so much flash that it becomes hard to know what is actually model, and what is flash.  Happily most of the pieces are doubled so you can tell what's what.  Here's one of the fists with large flash tubes on it.

Shoulder pads with loads of flash.  The resin is pretty easy to cut off, but there are sometimes small air bubbles in some of the edges.  I'll have to use greenstuff to fill them in, unless I can find a better filler.

Inner shoulder. When you cut off the flash, the parts are fantastic to look at. This dude is going to look awesome, but there are lots of large blank sheets to put some fun detail painting on.

Temple Flameguard Plastic Review

I've started gluing together my new Protectorate Flameguard, and I figured since these are new figs, that I'd keep a record.

First off, group shot.  These figs are great.  First of all, they are far less complicated than the Examplar Errants.  They fit well, and the sculpts are wonderful.

 Also, again unlike the Errants, these figs are easy to figure out which arms go with each torsos.  Each arm is keyed which makes it even easier.

Note that the arms fit PERFECTLY.  I did trim the end off the key, but otherwise a perfect fit.  And no weird armor interfering with other pieces.

Rear shot, there was a little flash, but nothing some primer and paint shouldn't remove.  Also note something I'm not so keen on, the bent spear.

You can see the bent spear problem here.  Unsure what to do about it, although this is a common problem with Greek Hoplite figs. Perhaps I could mount some stiff steel wire to the underside..

Here is the mounting amount of unpainted Protectorate figs that I've finally glued together.  In you can see the Flameguard, the Flameguard standard bearer and unit leader, 4 more Deliverers (to bring my unit up to full strength), and an Errant Exemplar with his ridiculous flags folded in.  I'll show in another post.

New Tyrant Guard...Finished!

Alright, I have spent enough time about what is wrong with the 6th ed Tyranid Codex so I figured it was time to look at what's right. All the models for this release are absolutely fantastic, just like virtually all of the recent Tyranid models. The Tervigon, Trygon, Harpy and Haruspex are all some of the best kits that GW makes and they also did a fantastic job updating the standard warriors with the new kit.The one kit I purchased though with the codex was a box of Tyrant Guard as I only had 2 and they seem very small to me.

For the most part I love these figs. They are significantly more dynamic than the previous edition and have tonnes of fantastic little details. I really love the ripped up Space Marines attached to their bases and the head in the one guys hand. I also love the battle damage on the figs. They are also tonnes of extra bits, some of which I have already used to update some of my older models. The only thing I DON'T like on this new model are the Tyrant Guard shoulder pieces. I originally didn't mind them until I put my Tyrant in the squad to see how they looked. The "swoosh" look of the shoulders has a completely different aesthetic then the rest of the army. I really wish I took the time to convert some new shoulder pieces to match the old models. That said I still might do that. Anyways, the models are still great and I am really loving how the bases turned out.

Next Up: My updated Tyranid Prime! I am also starting to plow through my Gargoyles and the last of my Termagants. Big push at the moment is to 100% finish everything I have for my Tyranids. Looking forward to having a 100% complete army.

Tyranid Battle Report!

Over the weekend I finally managed to get my first game in with the new Tyranid Codex. I couldn’t really decide which type of list I wanted so I figured I would just throw down all my big bugs and see how it went. I played against my friend Jason who has an amazing look Nurgle Army. We have had a few battles in the past and it has always been a tight game and I figured this would be more of that.