Category: Warhammer 40,000

New Year, New(ish) Armies 2025

On By Chris B.In Age of Sigmar, Flesh Eaters, Hive Fleet Cerberus, Kruleboyz, Orruks, Planning Ahead, Silver Stars, Space Marines, Tyranids, Warhammer 40,0005 Comments

It’s that time of year when hobby plans are drawn up for the months ahead, so I thought it would be a good idea to share my plans for 2025. This is not only for my benefit, but also so we can all have a chuckle when I fail to meet the ambitious targets by the end of the year!

Tyranids

In January 2024 I introduced Hive Fleet Cerberus as my next big project. That plan didn’t quite survive contact with the enemy (the enemy in this case being hobby time management), but I’m keen to press on with the Tyranids as a high priority this year. The new Warrior Bioform Onslaught detachment has particularly inspired me!

Kruleboyz

The Kruleboyz have been a back burner project for almost as long as the Tyranids, but I’d like to give them more focus and try and get a painted and playable Kruleboyz Spearhead on the table and some Age of Sigmar games under my belt. The new Orruk Battletome is also imminent at time of writing, which seems like a good time to jump in.

Kill Team

I need to get up-to-speed with the new edition of Kill Team, which includes buying the new rules and finishing my Silver Stars Astartes Kill Team.

Flesh Eaters

I plan to “finish” the Flesh Eaters this year – although can you ever really finish an army? – with a few more units, vehicles and characters. I also hope to finish the year with one final Armies on Parade entry for this army.

New Year, New Challenge

The Warhammer Community team have thrown down the gauntlet with the New Year, New Challenge bingo card. Taking part and posting your progress online gets you entered into a voucher prize draw, and completing a row can earn you a pin badge in Warhammer stores. I’ll be giving this a go!

So those are my hobby plans for the year! I also have a few other minor projects and one-off miniatures on the workbench which I’ll be posting soon. I hope you all have plenty of plans in mind for fun hobby too. As ever, thanks very much for reading, and please remember you can also find me sharing my work on Instagram, Threads, Bluesky and Mastodon.

Da Red Gobbo’s A-Bomb-Inable Snowman

On By Chris B.In LEDs, Orks, Warhammer 40,0005 Comments

It just wouldn’t be Christmas without the Red Gobbo, so here’s my take on Games Workshop’s 2024 Christmas miniature, ‘Da Red Gobbo’s A-Bomb-Inamble Snowman’! Most of my LED miniature projects are meant for gaming so it’s always a nice change to paint a display model at this time of year. You may remember my take on Da Red Gobbo’s Surprise and Da Red Gobb & Bounca from previous years.

Modelling

Each year when the new Red Gobbo is announced I’ve check the preview images for signs of sculpted Christmas lights and other light sources to work out how many LEDs I’m going to need to order. This year had fewer than normal. The grenade fuse was an obvious one, but there were also lights on the wire connecting the bomb timer to the snowman. As these are partially hidden, I thought it might be fun to compliment them with an additional light on top of the bomb.

The object on the end of the grot assistant’s hat are open to interpretation. They could be lights, but I decided that making them lights would draw focus away from the Red Gobbo himself, so I painted them as sleigh bells instead!

The grenade fuse effect has been created from a Yellow/Amber 0805 Chip LED (3V) coated in acrylic gel, as per my Simple Muzzle Flare tutorial. To give the impression of sparks flying out of the fuse, I also added some very small lengths of fibre optic cable to the gel before it hardened. If you don’t want to purchase a full reel of fibre optic cable for this, you can simply cut small sections from a child’s toy using a sharp hobby knife.

I thought it might be fun if the LEDs connected to the bomb wiring were flashing, to help sell the idea it was counting down to detonation. The LEDs used were Red 0805 Flashing Chip LEDs (3V), flashing at approximately 1.5Hz. Each LED has its own inbuilt timer, and interestingly you can see minor variations in the manufacturing process mean that the frequency of each LED is very slightly different, so they slowly move out of sync. This was unintentional, but I don’t mind as I think it adds to the countdown effect – it reminds me of the lights on the Predator’s wrist-mounted self destruct mechanism!

Painting

Painting this miniature took longer than I expected. It felt like a relatively small miniature, but there were a lot of different colours used and areas of high detail. I mostly followed my own Ork-related paint recipes found in this article and the suggestions for previous Red Gobbos in the Citadel Colour App. I did consider using snow flock or texture again, as I had previously with Red Gobbo & Bounca, but I decided against it as I didn’t want to risk obscuring the details on the base.

I repainted the snow on this miniature because I wasn’t happy with my first attempt, and to be honest I’m not sure I’m 100% happy with the final version. But ‘perfect’ is the enemy of ‘done’, as they say! The snow recipe I settled on is shown below. All paints are Citadel Colour unless specified otherwise.

  • White Snow
  • Corax White base coat
  • Apothecary White shade
  • Skull White heavy drybrush
  • Fenrisian Grey thin glaze in areas of compacted snow (e.g. footprints)

I shared this tip for painting miniature Christmas baubles with last year’s Red Gobbo, but I’d like to share it again. base coat the bauble in a light silver like Runefang Steel, and then apply two coats of either Spiritstone Red, Soulstone Blue or Waystone Green. This gives a lovely glossy, metallic festive finish!

That’s all for today, I hope you’ve enjoyed my latest take on the Red Gobbo. I wasn’t the only one to make an LED Red Gobbo this year – check out these other versions from warhamster_king_of_leds and therealmcrafter.

I still have a few more miniatures that I want to get finished before the end of the year, so please stay tuned over the Christmas holidays. As ever, thanks very much for reading, and please remember you can also find me sharing my work on Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, Mastodon, and Twitter/X.

Silver Stars Marksman

On By Chris B.In LEDs, Silver Stars, Space Marines, Technical, War of the False Primarch, Warhammer 40,0002 Comments

I’m still tidying up after Armies on Parade this week. Last week I was rebasing Brother Garrett, and this week I’m doing the same for the Silver Stars Marksman. This sniper was last seen taking aim at the Flesh Eaters on my 2024 Armies on Parade, but now he has been given a proper base to join my growing Silver Stars Angels of Death Kill Team. He will take the role of ‘Intercessor Warrior with Stalker Bolt rifle’. This miniature will also be my entry into Apologist’s #HiddenArmies challenge.

Modelling

As with all my previous Silver Stars, this marine is built using a Primaris marine body and legs. The arms, pauldrons, backpack and bolter are from the previous version of the plastic Legion MkIII Tactical Squad set. To give the legs a more “antiquated” look, I added Mixed Micro Glass Balls from Green Stuff World as armour studs on the legs. To get the sniper pose, the legs required significant cutting an repositioning. You can see a work in progress image below, before I filled in the gaps with modelling putty.

The head is from the Legion MkVI Tactical Squad sprue. All of my Silver Stars are either wearing helmets or masks that cover their face. They are also all unnamed, unlike my Flesh Eaters. This is to help add to their sense of mystery.

When rebasing this miniature for game use, I thought it might be fun if he was seeking cover from incoming fire, just to help sell the pose. The LED techniques used here are based on my Simple Muzzle Flare tutorial, only with three LEDs connected in parallel instead of one.

I used a small section of cork tile to represent a broken concrete wall. Cork tile is great for this sort of thing as it is easy to work with and has a great texture when torn.

Normally I run the wires inside my miniatures, but because cork tile is quite soft, it’s difficult to drill through, especially for multiple wires. So in this case I simply concealed the wires under a layer of Milliput and then added some textured paste to help conceal it.

The final stage was to apply Green Stuff World acrylic gel to the LEDs, as per my Simple Muzzle Flare tutorial. To give the impression of additional debris, I also added some very small lengths of fibre optic cable to the gel before it hardened. If you don’t want to purchase a full reel of fibre optic cable for this, you can simple cut small sections from a child’s toy using a sharp hobby knife.

Painting

I used the same paint recipe for this Silver Star as detailed in this post, plus this post which expands on painting Silver Stars insignia. As you can see, this Marksman is another member of Squad Antimony.

The graffiti on the broken wall was influenced by this classic 40K diorama shown in the Rogue Trader rulebook.

That’s all for today, I hope you’ve enjoyed this insight into the latest member of my Silver Stars Kill Team. As ever, thanks very much for reading, and please remember you can also find me sharing my work on Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, Mastodon, and Twitter/X.

Brother Garrett, Flesh Eater Assault Intercessor

On By Chris B.In Flesh Eaters, LEDs, Space Marines, War of the False Primarch, Warhammer 40,0001 Comment

A dagger in the dark is worth a thousand swords at dawn.

Imperial Proverb

It’s more Armies on Parade aftermath from me this week. Last week I was finishing up a Silver Stars Vox Operator who missed the deadline. This week I’m converting Brother Garrett – last seen sneaking through a pipe in my 2024 Armies on Parade entry to gut an enemy sniper – into a properly based and game-ready member of my Assault Intercessors.

Modelling & Painting

Although I’m lucky enough to have a dedicated hobby space, I don’t have space to permanently store all my various display boards. Even before ‘Ambush at Pipeline 13’ was finished, I knew that I would be taking it apart and reusing the components elsewhere. Brother Garrett was easy to repurpose, and fairly simple as my LED miniatures go. He uses the techniques set out in my LED Eye Lens tutorial. The helmet eye lens effects are built around a Tru Opto Green 1.8mm LED with a 10 ohm resistor.

The servo skull was also originally spotted buzzing around Pipeline 13. It was built around a plastic servo skull and using the same techniques I used with Brother Nikko and Inquisitor Kant. I drilled out the eye and fed the wires of a 3V green 0603 nano SMD chip LED in through the eye hole and out of the bottom of the skull, then gently pushed the LED into the hole with fine tweezers. The wires then formed the “tail” of the servo skull. Then I applied a small blob of Water Splash Effect Gel, available from Green Stuff World, to fill in the hole over the LED. When adding the servo skull to Brother Garrett’s base, I simply wired it in parallel with Brother Garrett’s helmet LED. Both LEDs are controlled by a single switch in the base next to the battery.

The helmet eye lenses and the eye on the servo skull both received a glaze of Citadel Biel-Tan Green. This is to give the eyes some colour when the LED is off, as you can see in the image below (right).

Brother Garrett’s pose made the most sense in his original context when he was ‘mid sneak‘, but hopefully even out of that context he still looks like he is preparing to deliver a stealthy kill. The knife sheath strapped to his shoulder is from the Primaris Intercessors kit. I had to cut off around a quarter of its length to prevent it overhanging the shoulder pad, and it’s still large enough to obscure his vision to the left. Ah well, ‘rule of cool’ always wins!

I don’t really have anything new to say on the paint scheme. I used my standard Flesh Eaters paint recipes detailed here. The only difference was using additional glazes of Nuln Oil and Gryph-Charger Grey applied to the blade of the combat knife to add reflection points to the true metallic metal, as you can see in the image above (left).

That’s all for today, I hope you’ve enjoyed this insight into my latest Flesh Eaters marine. There will be even more Armies on Parade aftermath next week, so stay tuned! As always, thanks very much for reading, and please remember you can also find me sharing my work on Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, Mastodon, and Twitter/X.

Silver Stars Vox Operator

On By Chris B.In LEDs, Silver Stars, Space Marines, War of the False Primarch, Warhammer 40,0006 Comments

This week I’ve added to my small squad of Silver Stars with a new vox operator. The Silver Stars are the mysterious chapter leading the Partisan forces in the War of the False Primarch. Although I’m fighting on the side of the Orthodox forces in this campaign with my Flesh Eaters, I have been slowly putting together a small force of Silver Stars to add a bit of flavour to my army display boards. This marine was intended to join his brothers on my ‘Ambush at Pipeline 13’ Armies on Parade board, but I ran out of time to finish him before the deadline.

Modelling

My aim with this model was to show a lit auspex screen. Readers who have been following my work for a while may remember a similar miniature in the past which was my Lamenter Comms Specialist.

When compared to my standard LED tutorials, this is closest to my Simple LED Muzzle Flare tutorial, only with an auspex screen instead of a muzzle flare. The LED wires run through the hand, arm, torso and left leg to join up with the resistors, switch and single CR2023 battery hidden in the base. The LEDs used are two Green Stuff World 1mm ‘Warm White’ LEDs connected in parallel. Two adjacent LEDs are intended to give the impression of two separate ‘pings’ on the screen. After hollowing out the auspex and inserting the LEDs, I used the ever-reliable Acrylic Splash Gel to fill in the screen. Once this was dry I painted two coats of with Citadel Spirit Stone Red, as this is a slightly gloss glaze and helps the screen to look good when the LEDs are switched off. Finally I added some additional lines to the screen using Citadel Wild Rider Red.

As with the previous Silver Stars, this marine is built using a Primaris marine body and legs. The arms, pauldrons, backpack, bolter and holstered pistol are from the previous version of the plastic Legion MkIII Tactical Squad set. To give the legs a more “antiquated” look, I added Mixed Micro Glass Balls from Green Stuff World as armour studs. The head is from the Legion MkVI Tactical Squad sprue, as are the antenna and vox elements of the backpack. This all helps to make the provenance of the Silver Stars armour intentionally unclear.

Painting

With the time pressure of Armies on Parade out of the way, it was nice to actually take my time over painting a Silver Stars marine! If you’re interested in the paint recipes I used, you can find a detailed list in this previous post. As I had more time, I refined my freehand process for the insignia. Details are below, all paints are Citadel unless specified otherwise.

  • White Insignia on Rose Band
  • Thinned Administratum Grey layer to produce rough outline of insignia
  • Corax White layer
  • 3:1 Screamer Pink:Lahmian Medium thin glaze
  • White Insignia on Blue Field
  • Thinned Administratum Grey layer to produce rough outline of insignia
  • Corax White layer
  • 3:1 Sotek Green:Lahmian Medium thin glaze
  • Dark Insignia on White Field
  • Slightly thinned Rhinox Hide layer
  • 3:1 Ulthuan Grey:Lahmian Medium thin glaze

This vox operator is from the unit dubbed ‘Squad Antimony’ by Orthodox codifiers during the War of the False Primarch – their actual squad designation remains unknown! The Silver Stars heraldry is quite different from other chapters, and they make use of alchemical and astrological symbols, as well as cuneiform numbers. You are very unlikely to find conventional High Gothic text or numerals on their armour. If you’d like to read more on this then Apologist has an excellent article on Silver Stars markings and heraldry.

That’s all for today, I hope you’ve enjoyed this insight into my latest Silver Star marine. I have a few more Silver Stars on the way soon, so stay tuned! As ever, thanks very much for reading, and please remember you can also find me sharing my work on Instagram, Threads, Twitter/X, Bluesky and Mastodon.