Sisters of Battle Exorcist a bit more progress

It still does not look like much, but its the way I paint! There are more layers of bleached bone to apply lightning to almost white on the upper surfaces. The plan is to use the new washes on the reliefs of the side panels to give some colour to the pious imagery. The launchers need a baroque heated and stressed  metal finish a bit like the penitent engine here . Bits still look loose because they are. Hopefully more progress next week.

First Exorcist post
Second Exorcist post

A Discovery - working with green stuff

The Belismite Chem Dogs masks and hoses are made from green stuff. This is my first attempt to add to minis with green stuff as opposed to filling in gaps. There are four squads of Belismites. The 4th is in the process of finishing, I have always found it difficult to manage the green stuff as it always prefers to stick to my fingers or the GW sculpting tool rather than the model, even when using water to reduce that stickiness. Too much water and it does not stick to anything. Today I discovered the easy way to stick a tube of green stuff to a mounting and shortly  after have a bond sufficiently strong that the tube can be bend, and manoeuvred to fix the other end correctly - use super glue to stick it to the first position and then the next. Any one else found this ?


Soon I hope the full Belismite platoon will be finished, part of Lord Commissar Belismite's private army.

Sisters of Battle Exorcist progress

It does not look like much but there has been quite a bit of effort to get to this point. GW has some odd ideas sometimes. The Exorcist kit comes as an Immolator plus some special metal parts to convert to an Exorcist. But without instructions how to fit it together. So on to the GW site to see pictures of a completed Exorcist. Clearly if I had been less experience in modeling there could have been significant difficulties. Anyway here is where it is at at the moment:

The side panels where the doors were to be have been glued in place and baroqued into coherence with the GW supplied front and rear metal panels representing extra armour. The launchers have been partially assembled. Everything had been undercoated white and a base coat of TauSept Ochre applied. Bolts/rivets have been added to the surround for the door replacement panels through the simple expedient of cutting off rivets/bolts from spare IG tank metal work and gluing them on. Better than superglue rivets and easier than plasticard dowel..

Rhino for Sisters of Battle Finished

Work on the Exorcist progresses, but there is little to see.The metal components need quite a bit of flashing sanded off and pins placed to hold the components together. The finish is not what you would expect with GW plastic kits. So while the Exorcist progresses unseen a bit of work has gone on with a new Steel Legion meltagunner using a Kreig meltagun from Forgeworld, the last Belisimite squad is almost finished just needing a bit of green stuffing and there has been a bit more work on the second Sisters Rhino, which is good as I just got the second sisters squad from ebay. A lot cheaper than GW at the moment. Here is the Rhino including its interior. Flash used for the interior, otherwise the flash is not used for my photos.

So what has changed since you last saw it? The purity seals, and the Sisters insignia on the rear door.The purity seals are Forgeworld. £6.00 a packet plus P&P from them or £2.49 including P&P from ebay. The rear door insignia has been cut from a spare top hatch. The oil drum and trenching tools from the IG and a spare storm bolter from the Exorcist. Thats it.

Sisters of Battle Penitent Engine - A Dark Redemption

From this to that. The Penitent Engine is finished. The Penitent Engine mini epitomises the dark side of the Imperium. Even the purity of the Battle Sisters has a dark side. Who should be strapped into such a lethal machine of painfully visceral redemption? The wicked are punished formally and through the law. And in any case are too untrustworthy to be made a component of such a powerful weapon. Hence the troubled innocent troubled with a great conscience over trivial misdemeanours will be strapped in for their redemption and doom. Once importuning for punishment and forgiveness reaches an unsatisfiable pinnacle the Cannoness ruling their order will have them strapped into one of the Engines. These Innocent Penitents demand that their sins require a  purgation  through sacrifice in the fire of battle such that  no mission may be permitted by their conscience to be merely a suicide mission to end their suffering. Endless battle and suffering is their fate until the inevitable happens and they are pitted against a superior foe. Should the battleground  be held by their Order the remains of the engine and penitent will be salvaged to be patched together with other components for the next penitent. In trying to create the feel of such a machine the only colours used for the engine itself were metallics and washes.

Sisters of Battle Exorcist Kit Bash

The 40k rumour mill predicts a new Grey Knights codex for next year. Originally I was going to post my Grey  Knights here, see below but in the meantime kit bashing instead of painting or finishing has been happening.

To the kit bash. The GW Sisters of Battle Exorcist has many fine details to recommend it. The 40k stat line making it a powerful bit of hardware in the game. And the mini itself. The Kit comes as an Immolator with additional metal bits. But no instructions. However it is straightforward to assemble if a due regard is paid to the images on the GW site and the supplied parts are carefully dry tested.

The model itself has amazing detail which is not immediately noticeable on the GW site images. The Launcher is loaded by a servitor loader with an automated missile magazine and and missile rack. There is a maddened battle sister playing the launcher keys. Aspect of the kit that gave me trouble were extra armour supplied by the metal plates and the access rhino hatches. After all its not a transport anymore. Access is required for the missiles to be loaded and the driver to climb in but otherwise nothing else. So the plasticard was brought out and new side armour and a rear door assembled. Here are the pictures below. Nothing is glued at the moment so there are gaps. Blue tack is the master.

Second Sisters of Battle Rhino Progress

Here it is. Not yet finished. The hull top and one side are still not finally glued together to allow access to the interior to finish painting this. I have forgotten to photograph the interior so that will be left for another day. Now it`s almost complete I am thinking of acquiring another squad of the Sisters. Costly as the price with GW has rocketed and also in parallel the prices on ebay have gone up. Anyway needs must. Here it is with laudhaler, pintle mounted storm bolter and hull mounted storm bolter. The paintwork needs tiding up and some additional tank tools added.

Penal Legion

The second squad of penal legionnaires approaches completion. Left to do are the shoulder pad transfers. Skulls to indicate condemned men and seals with indictment's of their crimes on the opposite shoulder. Here are the 2 squads:

Bits from the bits box used usefully I think.I like the second custodian with his Mordian head and WFB militia club. The "kilted" 2 were bretonnian archers. All the heads were catachian and balded to fit with the codex description of the penal legion.

Next time I hope to have some progress on my second Sisters of Battle Rhino conversion.

Favourite Minis - a bit off topic

A favourite range of minis from the GW has to be the Mordian Iron Guard. These are now on the collectors pages of the GW site but are not out of production. I find the poses and facial expressions better than the current Cadian plastic range which is reminiscent of modern infantry. The Catachians with their simets and US marine combats are too jingoistically yankee for my taste. Perhaps my preference is just nostalgia on my part as the Mordian Iron Guard were the first IG regiment I collected. I still have one squad left. The remainder have over the years been given away or sold on ebay. Whenever I can use them as veterans such as in an Inquisitor Lords Retinue, or as a veteran squad I do. The formal dress uniform of the Mordian Iron Guard is a bit a a Dan Dare type of futuristic army. Other IG minis I admire and feel are suitably scifi are the Steel Legion naturally and the Vostroyans. The plastics as on the box are unfortuately too retro for my tastes. Unfortunately because metal minis are so expensive now and getting ever more expensive as the GW refocuses it range on its plastics.

Penitent Engine Progress

OK, here is some progress with this. I envisioned the penitent engines to be recyclable. Strap in a penitent and throw him of her into battle until redeemed through glorious death for the Emperor. Repair the engine and strap another penitent in. These machines would be functional easy to repair and crude and battle filthy. The scheme I chose uses only metallics and washes except for flesh and banners. I have used magnets to hold the 2 parts of the body together making it easier to assemble and paint. The arms are to be attached with wire or possibly magnets if I can find small ones strong enough. Here are the pictures.

Steel Legion Meltaguns #2

I posted some time ago about a Steel Legion meltagun conversion that I attempted here . I was not too happy about the pose but as a first attempt I thought it could be OK. Later blogger stats revealed that the post was getting quite a few hits and the unease that I felt about the conversion was shared by Tyrus and Dizzy here .

The consequence is a revision and here it is with what seems to be a more convincing pose. Note the mini is not yet painted. Same mini by the way, different arm. More later.

The 40k Universe is a Horrible Place or the Belisimite Dogs

The 40k future where there is only war to sustain humanity is a bleak and vile anti utopia, an idea germinated from the black future visions of the 1970s when it seemed that the world would shortly end in a nuclear holocaust. Yet when getting down to construct an army for the board killer lists abound with space marines, or chaos space marines or mechanised IG battle forces. The dark elements of the 40k Universe are sanitized out of the picture with the squeaky clean elite units of the Imperium. Yet billions of unknown souls toil hopelessly living in polluted hive cities to serve vast planet spanning industrial factories. The IG is essentially an infantry army using hordes of poorly equipped and trained guardsmen thrown into battle unprepared in the face of unpredictable threats as the elite forces of the imperium are stretched to respond to recognized attacks.

Hence one of my battle forces is the IG Belismite Dogs. Work started on this with the previous IG codex. I am slow I know . But today I feel it is getting close to shaping up. Here is a first picture of the grimy fluff.

There are 3 troop choices, and 2 elite choices, one HQ

Battle Sisters Rhino Progress with Magnets

Magnets and more magnets. With this second Rhino, 2 sets of magnets have been used. Firstly the floor magnets to hold the imperial dozer blade in place, making dozer blade switchable with the first rhino here. A second array of magnets gives it the ability to hold the Sisters Rhino Ram as supplied. The ram itself is a little bit too small for magnets so this time 4 steel staples have been superglued into a groove scored in the ram. Gives a little bit of flexibility in advance of the expected the Witch Hunters Codex in 2011. See pics below. Apologies for the blurriness of the last image. I had nothing to rest the camera on.

Penal Legion More Progress and some causality

The second penal legion squad is progressing towards completion. I like the idea of the penal legion squads adding some randomness to the force they are attached to. In a competitive gaming environment where players select a power list to ensure a win by blowing or munching the enemy away typically the only factor that determines the winner is the chance of dice rolls. When this happens you can be certain that the winner is simply the luckiest player not the best general. Power list games often result in a draw. That's the law of averages. Adding a variable element to your force allows a player to rise to the occasion and show some generalship. What made Napoleon, Julius Caesar, Hannibal and Alexander the Great stand out was their ability to turn adverse circumstance to their advantage repeatedly and win despite conventional wisdom that they should lose.
Adding the handicap of not knowing exactly how your force will perform allows the player to demonstrate generalship. Winning through power listing shows the soul of an accountant. 

Here are the 2 squads :

Inquisitor and Retinue Styles

Styles for Inquisitors. There are two basic styles. The shooty Inquisitor and retinue - 2 sages are a prerequisite or the combat munchies Inquisitor and retinue. The last challenge is fitting it all into a reasonable points debit. Here are my 2 attempts. firstly the shooty Inquisitor and retinue and then the combat munchies.

Question - how many points in each squad?

Easy Shotgun Conversions for Imperial Guard Veterans 40k

One long term project is the completion of a squad of veterans armed with shotguns. There are a few conversion guides around on the internet but they all seemed fussy. Here is another way to do it.


Ingredients are one catachian flamer barrel for the shot gun barrel. One lasrifle cut down to provide the body and one crossbow from the warhammer militia box. An extra hand is also helpful. The pictures should be self explanatory.

Basic ingredients

Nascent shotgun in center with extra hand at top

The models chosen for the veterans are naturally veterans themselves. They are original games workshop imperial guard, Bob Olley sculpts. It seemed appropriate to use older minis for the veterans.

Sisters of Battle Rhino progresses slowly

Some more work on the gunner. Anyone who has built an Immolator knows that the gunner sister is just a front shell to be glued to the seat back. To sit in an open turret ring requires a back to be fashioned. It could be scuplted from green stuff I suppose. My solution was to add a cope using the hanging skull drape supplied with the kit and fill the gaps with green stuff. Reasonably effective I thought. Here it is and the tmin linked bolter. Hands form an IG heavy bolter team. Turret ring modified to support a mount for the bolter. Here are some pics, low quality as the lighting is poor at the moment.

Penal Legion Progress

Time is not on my side. Progress has been incredibly slow, partly due to multiple projects and also down to life. House moving and work, fighting with windows on my PC etc has eroded time for painting and modelling. Anyway some progress has been made.

Question, what type of comand squad is applicable and game legal if all troops choices are filled with penal legion squads?

Sisters of Battle Rhino #2

Too many projects and not enough time. Anyway a little progress with the second rhino for the Sisters. The stormbolter gunner has been essentially created from the original immolator gunner. The torso, head and arms come from the original immolator kit. The hands and attachment to the storm bolter are from an IG bolter gunner while the mounting comes from the central control box on the immolator. A bit of green stuff and glue should finish it all off.

From above to the almost completed turret gunners on the right.

The other projects on the workbench are some Ogryns from ebay. The second squad of penal legion and another squad of the Belisimar chem dogs.